IMAGE  EVALUATION 
TEST  TARGET  (MT-S) 


1.0     ^^  ilM 

===         ^-    1132      :„„^^ 


I.I 


1.25 


-     6' 


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1.8 


U     1111.6 


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Photographic 

Sdences 
Corporation 


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CIHM/ICMH 

Microfiche 

Series. 


CIHIVI/ICMH 
Collection  de 
microfiches. 


Canadian  Institute  for  Historical  Microreproductions 


Institut  Canadian  de  microreproductions  historiques 


1980 


Technical  and  Bibliographic  Notes/Notes  techniques  et  bibliographiques 


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the  usual  method  of  filming,  are  checked  below. 


D 


D 


D 
D 


D 
D 


D 


D 


Coloured  covers/ 
Couverture  de  couleur 


I      I    Covers  damaged/ 


Couverture  endommagde 


Covers  restored  and/or  laminated/ 
Couverture  restaurde  et/ou  pellicul6e 


□    Cover  title  missing/ 
Letit 


titre  de  couverture  manque 


Ccloured  maps/ 

Cartes  gdographiques  en  couleur 


Coloured  ink  (i.e.  other  than  blue  or  black)/ 
Encre  de  couleur  (i.e.  autre  que  bleue  ou  noire) 


□    Coloured  plates  and/or  illustrations/ 
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modification  dans  la  mithode  normale  de  filmage 
sont  indiqu6s  ci-dessous. 


□    Coloured  pages/ 
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D 

D 
D 
D 
D 
D 


D 


Pages  damaged/ 
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Pages  restaurdes  et/ou  pelliculdes 

Pages  discoloured,  stained  or  foxed/ 
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obtenir  la  meilleure  image  possible. 


Tl 
to 


Tl 

P< 
o1 

fil 


O 
bt 
th 
si 
ol 
fil 
sii 

Ol 


Tl 
sh 
Tl 
w 

M 
di 
er 
be 

"J 
re 


0 


This  item  is  filmed  at  the  reduction  ratio  checked  below/ 

Ce  document  est  filmd  au  taux  de  reduction  indiqu6  ci-dessous. 


10X 

14X 

18X 

22X 

26X 

30X 

J 

12X 


16X 


20X 


24X 


28X 


32X 


The  copy  filmed  here  has  been  reproduced  thanks 
to  the  generosity  of: 

National  Library  of  Canada 


L'exemplaire  filmi  fut  reproduit  grdce  d  la 
g6n6rositi  de: 

Bibliothdque  nationale  du  Canada 


The  images  appearing  here  are  the  best  quality 
possible  considering  the  condition  and  legibility 
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filming  contract  specifications. 


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beginning  with  the  front  cover  and  ending  on 
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sion, or  the  back  cover  when  appropriate.  All 
other  original  copies  are  filmed  beginning  on  the 
first  page  with  a  printed  or  illustrated  impres- 
sion, and  ending  on  the  last  page  with  a  printed 
or  illustrated  impression. 


The  last  recorded  frame  on  each  microfiche 
shall  contain  the  symbol  — »-  (meaning  "CON- 
TINUED "),  or  the  symbol  V  (meaning  "END"), 
whichever  applies. 


Les  images  suivantes  ont  6x6  reproduites  avec  le 
plus  grand  soin,  compte  tenu  de  la  condition  et 
de  la  netteti  de  l'exemplaire  film6,  et  en 
conformity  avec  les  conditions  du  contrat  de 
filmage. 

Les  exemplaires  originaux  dont  la  couverture  en 
papier  est  imprimis  sont  filmds  en  comment  ant 
par  le  premier  plat  et  en  terminant  soit  par  la 
dernidre  page  qui  comporte  une  empreinte 
d'impression  ou  d'illustration,  soit  par  le  second 
plat,  selon  le  cas.  Tous  les  autres  exemplaires 
originaux  sont  film6s  en  commenpant  par  la 
premidre  page  qui  comporte  une  empreinte 
d'impression  ou  d'illustration  et  en  terminant  par 
la  dernidre  page  qui  comporte  une  telle 
empreinte. 

Un  des  symboles  suivants  apparaltra  sur  la 
dernidre  image  de  cheque  microfiche,  selon  le 
cas:  le  symbole  — »>  signifie  "A  SUIVRE",  le 
symbole  V  signifie  "FIN". 


Maps,  plates,  charts,  c  ■■.,  .T^ay  be  filmed  at 
different  reduction  re    *.  Those  too  large  to  be 
entirely  included  in  one  expo&ure  are  filmed 
beginning  in  the  upper  left  hand  corner,  left  tc 
right  and  top  to  bottom,  as  mrmy  frames  as 
required.  The  following  diagrams  illustrate  the 
method: 


Les  cartes,  planches,  tableaux,  etc.,  peuvent  dtre 
film^s  d  des  taux  de  reduction  diffdrents. 
Lorsque  le  document  est  trop  grand  pour  dtre 
reproduit  en  un  seul  clich6,  il  est  filmd  d  partir 
de  Tangle  supdrieur  gauche,  de  gauche  &  droite, 
et  de  haut  en  bas,  en  prenant  le  nombre 
d'images  ndcessaire.  Les  diagrammes  suivants 
illustrent  la  mdthode. 


1 

2 

3 

1  2  3 

4  5  6 


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/M^ 


HENRY    W.    GRADY 


The  Editor 
The  Orator 

The  Man 


45, 


By  JAMES   W.    LEE 

Author  of ''The  Making  of  a  Afan,"  '^Earthly  Footsteps 
of  the  Man  of  Galilee"  etc. 


FLEMING  H.  REVELL  COMPANY, 
New  York.  Chicago.  Toronto. 

Publishers  cf  Evangelical  Literature. 


3114 


\ 


Copyrighted  jSg6  by 
Fleming  H.  Revell  Company. 


4 


JLo 


COL.    EVAN    P.    HOWELL 
AND 
MK.   W.  A.   HEMPHILL, 
WHO  FOUNDED  AND  HAVE  GUIDED  THE  FORTUNES 
OF  THE    GREAT    NEWSPAPER    THROUGH    WHICH 
HENRY  W.   GRADY  GAVE  HIS  MESSAGE  OF  HOPE 
AND     INSPIRATION     TO    THE    PEOPLE     OF    HIS 
COUNTRY. 


c 


THE  MISSION  OF  A 
GREAT  LIFE. 


"There  is  a  soul  above  the  soul  of  each, 
A  mightier  soul,  which  yet  to  each  belongs; 

There  is  a  sound  made  of  all  human  speech, 
And  numerous  as  the  concourse  of  all  songs; 

And  in  that  soul  lives  each,  in  each  that  soul, 
Though  all  the  ages  are  its  lifetime  vast; 

Each  soul  that  dies,  in  its  most  sacred  whole 
Receiveth  life  that  shall  forever  last. 

And  thus  forever  with  a  wider  span 
Humanity  o'erarches  time  and  death; 

Man  can  elect  the  universal  man. 
And  live  in  life  that  ends  not  with  his  breath; 

And  gather  glory  that  increases  still 
Till  Time  his  glass  with   Death's  last  dust 
shall  fill." 

Richard  Watson  Dixon, 


INTRODUCTION. 

Human    life,    in   all   its   length  and 
depth  and    breadth,    is   one.     Like  a 
vast  ocean,  it  throws  itself  against  the 
shores  of  all    time   and  sends   up    its 
waters  to  fill  and  feed  and  refresh  the 
heart  of  every  man.     The  waters  upon 
which  the  ships  sail  up  to  the  quay  of 
Liverpool  to-day  are   the    same    that 
washed  the  shores  of  England  in  the 
time    of    Julius    Ciesar.     The    waves 
which  sob  and  murmur  between  the 
dangerous  rocks  of  Jaffa  to-day  are  the 
same  that  held  in  their  arms  the  crafts 
that  brought  the  cedars  from  Lebanon 
which  Solomon  used  in  the  building  of 
the  Temple. 

The  life  that  throbs  in  the  hearts  of 
the  fourteen  hundred  millions  of  peo- 


10 


HENRY  IV.  GRADY 


pie  who  live  on  the  earth  to-day  is  the 
same  life  that  throbbed  in  human 
hearts  when  Rameses  I  I.  oppressed 
the  children  of  Israel,  and  when  Shi- 
shak,  the  Kin^'  of  Ef,'ypt,  captured  Jer- 
usalem in  the  time  of  Rehoboam. 

Shore  lines  have  changed;  here  the 
sea  has  made  inroads  upon  the  land, 
and  there  the  land  has  taken  the  place 
of  the  sea;  but  it  is  the  same  unrest- 
ing;, inexhaustible,  briny  deep  that 
throu^^h  all  the  ages  rolls  round  and 
round  the  world.  Individuals  have  ap- 
peared and  passed  away;  new  opinions 
havij  come  to  take  the  place  of  old 
ones;  new  hearts  respond  to  the  ever 
moving  tide  where  other  hearts  beat 
before;  but  it  is  the  same  mysterious, 
unfathomable  life  that  has  lifted  itself  up 
to  create  and  complete  self-conscious- 
ness in  all  the  individuals  who  have 
toiled  and  feared  and  hoped  and  lived 
and  died  on  earth. 


MISS  ION  OF  A  GREA  T  LIFE       11 


the 


The  reel  current  that  flowed  from  the 
heart  of  God  into  the  veins  of  man 
created  in  his  image  in  the  morning  of 
the  world,  has  increased  and  extended 
itself  over  the  globe  and  has  capacity 
to  widen  itself  to  the  utmost  bounds  of 
time. 

The  same  atoms  of  oxygen  and  the 
same  atoms  of  nitrogen  have  been 
keeping  company  from  the  beginning 
of  man's  appearance  on  earth,  that 
they  might  feed  and  keep  ablaze  the 
flame  of  life. 

The  same  subtle  something  which 
scientists  call  ether,  that  surrounds 
and  penetrates  all  worlds  and  fills  up 
the  vacant  spaces  which  seem  to  lie 
between  all  constellations,  has  been 
utilized  from  the  time  of  Adam  to  the 
present  to  transport  the  rays  of  the  sun 
over  ninety-five  millions  of  miles  to 
light  the  pathway  and  build  the  forest 


la 


HENRY  W.   GRADY 


and  produce  the  food  for  the  children 
of  God. 

The  lightning  that  draws  our  car  and 
lights  our  street  and  cooks  our  food,  is 
the  same  Elisha  saw  playing  about  the 
cloud  that  arose  to  put  to  confusion 
the  prophets  of  Baal  on  the  heights  of 
Carmel. 

There  is  no  new  ocean,  no  new 
atmosphere,  no  new  ether,  no  new 
lightning,  no  new  physical  life.  It 
is  the  same  atmosphere  feeding  the 
breath,  distributing  the  sounds,  and 
insuring  the  health  of  the  people  of  all 
races  and  times.  It  is  the  same  ether 
enwrapping  the  stars  and  connecting 
the  systems  and  mediating  the  light  of 
the  universe  in  all  the  centuries. 

It  is  the  same  electricity,  subtle, 
weird,  wild,  that  now  hides  in  the  air 
like  a  harmless,  invisible  ghost,  and 
then  like  a  fiend  writes  its  name  in 
letters  of  fire  across  the  bosom  of  the 


;  children 

ir  car  and 
r  food,  is 
ibout  the 
:onfusion 
leights  of 

no  new 
no  new 
life.  It 
iing  the 
ids,  and 
pie  of  all 
ne  ether 
nnecting 
light  of 

!S. 

subtle, 
1  the  air 
ost,  and 
name  in 
1  of  the 


MISSION  OF  A  GREAT  LIFE      13 

cloud,  that  has  been  the  wonder  and 
puzzle  of  mortals  in  the  flight  of  all  the 
years. 

So  it  is  the  same  wondrous,  immeas- 
urable human  life,  robust  in  the  will  of 
Menes,  the  first  king  of  Egypt;  stirred 
by  strange  rumors  from  the  skies  in  the 
spirit  of  Abraham,   the    father  of  the 
faithful;  exalted  and  sublime  and  lumin- 
ous as  it  rises  to  the  vision  of  God  in 
the  mind  of  Moses;  pathetic  and  mourn- 
ful,   as   it   measures    the    sorrow  of  a 
broken    heart   in  the  lamentations    of 
Jeremiah;  malignant  and    coarse  and 
base,  as  it  flows  through  the   dreams 
of  Herod;   undaunted,   unyielding  and 
triumphant,  as   it  glows  in  the  deter- 
mination of  Saint  Paul;   wild,  furious, 
as  the  pulse  beats  of  a  volcano,  as  it 
breaks  from  the  heart  of  Nero;   but  in 
all  it  is  the  same  life  that  has  flowed 
through  the  length  and  breadth  of  the 
human  race. 


14 


HENRY  W.  GRADY 


One  life,  with  expressions  as  varied 
as  the  individuals  who  have  found  in  its 
depths  the  support  of  their  thought 
and  feeling;  one  life,  whose  high  waves 
we  have  named  Abraham,  Job,  Con- 
fucius, Zoroaster,  Buddha,  Ezekiel, 
Daniel,  Isaiah,  Alexander  the  Great, 
Plato,  Aristotle,  Cato,  Savanarola, 
Luther,  Calvin,  Wesley,  Kant,  Bis- 
marck, Gladstone;  and  whose  little 
waves  that  never  rise  high  enough  to 
fleck  themselves  with  foam  or  crown 
their  heads  with  white  caps,  we  never 
name  at  all,  but  who  in  reality  are 
gladdened  and  blest  by  the  same  life 
that  rose  in  the  billows  which  all  men 
see. 

It  is  a  marvelous  evidence  of  God's 
economy  that  he  has  used  only  one 
life  to  support  and  furnish  and  com- 
plete the  countless  personalities  which 
have  appeared  upon  its  surface,  to 
learn  their  names,   to  recognize  their 


MISSION  OF  A  GREA  T  LIFE 


15 


accountability,   to  play  their  part  and 
then  to  pass  into  the  unseen. 

The  illustration  that  compares  a 
human  being  to  a  wave  of  the  sea, 
however,  must  not  be  carried  too  far. 
An  individual  is  like  a  wave  in  the  re- 
spect that  he  is  an  expression  of  the 
;;reat  underlying  sea  of  life,  but  he  is 
totally  unlike  a  wave  of  the  sea  in  the 
respect  that  in  rising  up  he  gets  organ- 
ized and  individuated,  and  empowered 
with  self-consciousness  and  self-deter- 
mination. A  wave  of  the  sea  comes 
up  from  the  general  fund  of  water  and 
sinks  back  as  it  came  up,  uncolored 
and  inarticulate.  But  a  human  being 
appears  like  a  wave  on  the  sea  of  life, 
and  finds  himself  met  and  held  and 
possessed  by  a  spirit  which  claims  him 
and  marks  him  and  puts  the  stamp  of 
personality  upon  him,  and  breathes  the 
power  and  immensity  of  personality 
within  him;  then  it  is  that  he  becomes 


IG 


HEA'RV  ^r.   GRADY 


v       ■■  I 


^'    \: 


|i        ! 


conscious  that  he  is  distinct  and  sepa- 
rate from  the  p^eneral  fund  of  hfe. 

He  is  then  no  longer  harnessed  in  t'le 
traces  of  physical  forces,  along  with  the 
damps  and  the  winds.  It  is  true  he 
still  finds  himself  housed  in  a  mansion 
of  perishing  elements,  held  by  the  laws 
of  gravity  and  rising  and  falling  with 
the  changing  temperature;  but  with 
the  dawn  of  self-consciousness  he  sees 
breaking  around  him  the  light  of  a  new 
day  and  lying  before  him  the  shores  of 
a  new  world. 

He  has  passed  from  the  realm  of 
matter  ponderable  and  measurable  and 
quantitative  to  the  realm  of  spirit,  im- 
ponderable, immeasurable  and  quali- 
tative. He  is  no  longer  a  child  of 
time;  he  is  a  citizen  of  eternity.  The 
v/aters  of  the  great,  heaving,  human 
sep  "ill  rise  around  his  heart;  but 
bav^is.  into  their  liquid  arms  they  can  no 
more  pull  and  disintegrate  and  scatter 


I! 


MISSION  OF  A  ORE  A  T  LIFE       17 


im  of 

and 

,  ini- 

uali- 

d   of 

The 

man 

but 

no 

tter 


his  self-determining  soul.  Instead  of 
being  subject  to  the  subconscious  bil- 
lows of  life  and  so  loosely  put  together 
that  they  are  able  easily  to  pull  him 
apart,  he  finds  the  billows  are  subject 
to  him  and  that  over  their  angry  heads 
and  through  their  surging  folds  he  can 
ride  on  his  triumphant  way.  Life  lifts 
him  up  but  does  not  possess  him  as  the 
sea  possesses  the  wave;  he  possesses 
it.  He  can  use  it  to  ride  against  the 
breakers  or  to  bear  him  to  some 
friendly  shore. 

He  can  use  electricity  to  send  a 
message  of  good  will  to  a  friend  across 
the  sea,  or  he  can  appropriate  it  and 
store  it  for  the  purpose  of  burning  his 
neighbor's  house.  He  can  use  the 
vibrations  of  the  atmosphere  to  bear 
from  his  lips  the  curses  which  measure 
his  rage,  or  the  prayers  which  indicate 
his  devotion.  So  the  life  which  rises 
within  him  to  make  possible  the  dis- 


18 


HENRY  W.  GRADY 


covery  of  his  personal  spirit,  he  can 
use  in  building  a  saint,  or  in  furnish- 
ing and  equipping  a  future  of  unutter- 
able misery. 

Strange,  that  from  the  same  life  one 
man  should  sip  the  elixir  that  eternally 
cheers  the  soul,  and  that  another 
should  drink  the  gall  that  embitters  it 
forever. 

The  contrast  in  the  different  uses  men 
have  made  of  life  is  infinite.  Cheops 
used  it  to  build  a  temple  of  stone 
to  repose  in  after  death,  that  promises 
to  last  as  long  as  the  Alps;  Enoch 
used  it  to  cultivate  the  acquaintance  of 
God,  and  learned  in  three  hundred 
years  so  completely  how  to  adjust  him- 
self to  the  companionship  of  Heaven 
that  God  took  him. 

Moses  used  it  to  tread  the  lonely  and 
sublime  heights  where  the  finite  spirit 
enters  into  correspondence  with  the  in- 
finite Spirit, 


i     tl 


\\ 


MISSION  OF  A  GREAT  LIFE 


10 


David  used  it  to  convert  into  sonfj 
and  prayer  and  praise,  and  thoii^^h 
weighted  with  the  cares  of  state,  he 
devoted  enough  of  his  hfe  to  silent 
meditation  to  enable  him  to  write  the 
literature  that  has  been  the  support  of 
the  spirit  in  its  attempts  to  rise  to  God 
ever  since. 

Isaiah  used  it  to  look  across  the  cen- 
turies to  the  time  when  the  knowledge 
of  the  Lord  should  cover  the  earth  as 
the  waters  cover  the  sea. 

Socrates  used  it  to  call  off  the  atten- 
tion of  the  youth  of  Athens  from  the 
deceitful  and  sordid  ways  of  life  to  the 
honorable  and  serene  majesty  of  intel- 
lectual manhood. 

Alexander  the  Great  used  it  as  so 
much  furious  force  with  which  to  carry 
devastation  and  despair  to  the  peoples 
of  the  world. 

Saint  John  used  it  to  feed  as  amiable 
a  heart  and  to  sustain  a  disposition  as 


90 


HENRY  IV.   GRADY 


i 


tender  and  sweet  as  ever  moved  amid 
the  conflicts  of  time. 

Robert  Raikes  converted  his  life  into 
clothes  for  ragged  children,  and  into 
knowledge  and  hope  and  heaven  for 
ignorant  and  lost  children. 

Charles  Dickens  used  up  his  life  in 
the  formation  of  stories  that  awakened 
anew  in  the  world  a  sense  of  kinship 
and  brotherhood  among  men. 

George  Peabody  converted  his  life 
into  the  accumulation  of  money  that 
he  might  use  it  to  widen  the  horizon 
of  thought  and  increase  nobility  of 
spirit  among  the  youth  of  coming 
times. 

So  variously  have  men  used  the  gift 
of  life;  coming  to  one  man  only  once, 
bringing  opportunities  to  shore  in  his 
spirit  only  once,  it  would  seem  that 
every  man  would  have  made  the  most 
of  it;  that  he  would  have  sounded  its 
translucent   depths   in    order   that   he 


MISSIOX  OF  A  GREAT  LII'E      21 

might  bring  to  the  fiirnisliment  of  his 
personahty  all  that  it  had  to  give;  but 
this  is  not  the  case;  but  a  cursory 
glance  over  the  history  of  the  race  is 
sufficient  to  show  us  that  more  men 
have  used  life  as  a  decoction  from  which 
to  distill  bitterness  than  have  used  it  as 
an  essence  from  which  to  draw  hope 
and  peace. 

Like  immortal  ships  the  spirits  of 
great  men  sail  the  ocean  of  time,  bear- 
ing the  treasures  and  the  archives  of 
the  civili;jations  which  gave  them  birth. 
They  outride  the  fury  of  all  the  storms 
and  will  sail  on  till:- 

"  The  stars  grow  old, 

The  sun  grows  cold, 

And  the  leaves  of  the  judgment  book  unfold." 

A  nation  is  unfortunate  beyond  ex- 
pression that  has  no  son  with  genius 
wide  and  universal  enough  to  embody 
and  convey  to  the  future  her  history. 
Whatever  may  be  her  wealth  and  her 


0'» 


//KA'RV  U:   GRADV 


il 


ii 


commercial  importance,  she  is  without 
a  future. 

Habylon  was  a  vast  and  rich  empire; 
she  embraced  the  most  fertile  portion 
of  the  j^lobe;  she  had  a  capitol  that 
eclipsed  all  others  in  splendor  and 
wealth;  but  amon^^  her  people  she 
found  no  man  amply  endowed  enough 
to  understand  and  f;ive  ])ermanent 
mental  setting  to  her  faith  and  her 
civilization.  Her  heart  throbs,  what- 
ever they  were,  got  interpreted  in  no 
poem,  explained  in  no  philosophy,  and 
written  in  no  history.  For  knowledge 
of  her  we  are  dependent  upon  her 
ruins,  her  broken  columns,  and  her 
pottery.  Among  none  of  her  luxurious 
inhabitants  did  she  find  a  genius  to 
commit  the  keeping  of  her  secrets  and 
the  records  of  her  progress.  Into 
oblivion  has  fallen  all  that  bejeweled 
and  pampered  life  that  revelled  in  her 
magnificent  palaces  and  amid  her  far- 


MISS/ON  OF  A  GREA  T  LlhE      :>3 


to 
nd 


famed  hanginp^  f^ardens.  Over  it  all 
has  settled  the  stillness  of  the  desert, 
and  the  j;looin  of  eternal  night. 

On  the  other  hand,  how  secure  is  the 
Greece  that  flowered  in  her  great  men. 
She  has  been  despoiled  of  her  art 
treasures,  her  temples  have  fallen,  the 
Parthenon  is  in  ruins,  'but  the  two 
hundred  years  of  her  life  which  she 
deposited  in  her  great  men  are  im- 
mortal. No  tooth  of  time,  no  war's 
bloody  hand,  no  devastation  of  the 
years,  can  take  from  her  the  glory 
which  she  lifted  and  locked  in  the 
genius  of  her  generals,  her  artists,  her 
statesmen,  and  her  philosophers. 

Epaminondas  and  Pericles  still  fight 
for  her  and  guard  with  sleepless  vigi- 
lance her  fair  name.  Plato  and  Aris- 
totle still  interpret  her  problems  of 
destiny.  Sophocles  and  Pindar  still 
sing  her  glory.  Herodotus  and  Thucy- 
dides  still  keep  the  record  of  her  victo- 


24 


J/luXRY  IV.  GRADY 


ries.  Demosthenes  and  yli^schines  still 
declare  her  matchless  eloquence. 
Appclles  and  Phidias  still  ^nve  imperish- 
able expression  to  her  conceptions  of 
form  and  beauty.  She  deposited  her 
riches  in  the  spirits  of  her  f;ieat  men, 
and  they  are  forever  secure.  No  thief 
can  steal  them;  no  rust  can  corrupt 
them.  The  unfolding  centuries  may 
look  in  upon  them  and  enjoy  them, 
but    their  passage  through   the    years 

cannot  be  arrested. 

'*Tlie  soul  of  man  is  larger  than  the  sky, 
Deeper  than  (jcean  or  the  abysmal  dark 
Of  the  unfathom'd  eentre.     Like  that  Ark 
Which   in  its  sacred  hold  uplifted  high, 
O'er  thedrown'd  hills,  the  hinnan  family, 
And  stock  reserv'd  of  every  living  kind. 
So,  in  the  compass  of  the  single  mind. 
The  seeds  and  pregnant  forms  in  essence  lie, 
That  make  all  worlds." 

It  was  the  misfortune  of  Tyre  that 
she  had  no  son  among  all  her  mer- 
chant princes  with  genius  universal 
and  deep  enough  to  bear  to  distant 
ages  a  record  of  her  inner  life. 


I       ! 


MISSJOX  OF  A  iJREA  T  LIFE 


25 


Life  in  Tyre  took  the  form  of  sails 
which  were  spread  to  every  breeze, 
and  the  strokes  (if  oars  heard  in  the 
waters  af  every  sea.  Her  hfe  stood  in 
many  storied 'houses,  rustled  in  the  silk 
of  Tyrian  purple,  and  uttered  itself  in 
the  ears  of  all  the  world.  But  what 
the  people  of  Tyre  thouj^ht  about 
death,  or  immortality,  or  duty,  or 
righteousness,  or  relij^^ion,  or  philoso- 
phy, or  poetry,  or  literature,  or  farm- 
ing, or  plowing,  or  cooking,  or  even 
sea-faring  or  trade,  we  can  never  know. 

Her  life  simply  lifted  itself  into  the 
mammoth  and  unparalleled  products  of 
the  merchandise  of  ancient  times.  It 
took  the  form  of  wharves,  of  ships,  of 
purple  awning,  of  revelry,  of  eating,  of 
drinking,  of  low  sensual  pleasure;  hence 
it  has  been  utterly  swept  away.  It 
stood  only  in  masts,  shipboards,  ivory 
benches,  sails,  pilots,  mariners,  towers, 
silver,   iron,    tin,    lead,    brass,    horses, 


26 


HENRY  IV.  GRADY 


mules,  broidered  work,  fine  linen, coral, 
agate,  honey,  oil,  balm,  wool,  cassia, 
calamus,  precious  clothes,  chariots, 
lambs,  spices,  chests,  merchants, 
riches,  sardius,  topaz,  diamond,  beryl, 
onyx,  jasper,  sapphire,  emerald,  car- 
buncle, tabrets  and  pipes. 

Through  these  it  lifted  itself  up  and 
defied  the  laws  of  God  and  man.  It 
brought  them  together  and  piled  them 
the  one  upon  the  other  without  reference 
to  the  moral  law,  which  is  to  the  spirit- 
ual world  what  the  laws  of  gravity  are 
to  the  physical.  Hence,  chough  they 
made  of  them  the  highest  and  most 
glittering  heap  that  ever  responded  to 
the  rays  of  the  sun  on  earth  before, 
they  were  disintegrated  and  scattered 
by  war  and  caught  by  the  sea  and 
to-day  are  buried  under  its  ever-moving 
waters. 

Of  Tyre  we  know  somethmg  from 
Ezekiel,   something   from   Herod,   and 


M/SS/OX  OF  A  GREA  T  LIFE       27 

something  from  Strabo,  and  something 
from  the  Bible  and  historians  among 
surrounding  nations.  But  as  far  as 
the  people  of  Tyre  themselves  are  con- 
cerned, they  have  mingled  with  the 
dust  or  gone  to  the  depths  of  the  sea 
without  leaving  a  single  record  that 
enables  us  to  get  the  history  of  that 
splendid,  wealthy,  thundering,  unright- 
eous city. 

It  was  a  magnificent  pageant;  it  was 
a  lurid,  multitudinous  dream;  it  was  a 
vision,  streaked  with  will-o'-the-wisp 
fire,  thrown  up  from  the  damps  of 
appetite  and  passion. 

It  was  an  unreal  air  castle,  raised  at 
great  labor,  without  foundation,  and 
harmonizing  with  nothing  that  was 
fixed  and  eternal. 

It  was  a  nightmare,  filled  with  regal 
and  splendid  actors,  but  uttering  their 
speech  and  playing  their  part  and  filling 
the  nights  of  centuries  to  no  purpose; 


WP 


28 


niuXRV  ir.   GRADY 


a  nightmare  to  be  broken  and  scattered 
without  a  trace  of  its  meaning  and 
awful  reahty  with  the  dawn  of  a  better 
day. 

It  was  a  tragedy  where  merchant 
princes  executed  the  wild  and  unregu- 
lated play,  but  with  no  Shakespeare 
to  transmute  it  into  spiritual  and  ever- 
lasting form. 

It  was  a  poem,  with  rhyme  and  all 
the  accompaniments  of  human  inter- 
ests, with  passion  and  cloud  and  fire 
and  birth  and  death;  but  with  noTasso 
to  bear  it  to  coming  generations. 

It  was  a  history  typifying  and  illus- 
trating the  stages  of  human  life  from 
Eden,  where  man  walked  with  God,  to 
the  bottom  of  hell,  where  he  lived 
with  devils;  but  with  no  Herodotus  to 
record  it. 

It  was  a  drama,  where  angels  from 
heaven  and  fiends  from  the  pit  con- 
tended   with    the    human    spirit,    and 


^riSSION  OF  A  GREAT  LIFE       29 

where  the  human  spirit  refused  the 
companionship  of  angels  and  chose 
rather  to  consort  with  fiends;  but  with 
no  Milton  to  clothe  it  in  forms  insuring 
it  immortality. 

Tyre  was  so  busy  eating  and  dress- 
ing and  drinking  and  trading  and  revel- 
ing that  she  raised  no  son  to  give 
eternal  setting  in  poetry  or  history  or 
tomb  or  art  or  religion  to  her  dark, 
unsounded  and  unuttered  life. 

Jerusalem  has  been  plundered  and 
pillaged  seventeen  times;  but  no  city 
has  existence  so  secure,  because  it  has 
been  transmuted  from  the  realm  of 
rock  and  marble  and  gold  and  war  and 
hate  and  blood,  to  the  realm  of  undying 
thought  and  unfailing  spirit. 

There   is  the  Jerusalem  of  Melchis- 
edec,   transmuted  by  his  faith  into  an 
eternal  city  rising  above  the  storms  and 
clouds  and  changing  fortunes  of  time, 
beautiful  and  fair  as  the  morning. 


fe. 


^ 


30 


HENRY  IV.   GRADY 


\%  i 


I    1 


There  is  the  Jerusalem  of  the  Jebus- 
ites,  anchored  forever  to  the  threshing 
floor  of  Araunah. 

There  is  the  Jerusalem  of  David, 
sweet  and  holy,  lifted  before  all  nations 
in  rhythm  and  perpetually  holding  its 
place  in  the  unchanging  spheres  by  its 
notes  of  divine  music,  palaces  in  song, 
olive  trees  in  song,  gates  in  song, 
Mount  of  Olives  in  song,  charming  the 
ear  and  refreshing  the  hearts  of  the 
saints  of  all  ages. 

There  is  the  Jerusalem  of  Solomon, 
with  its  temple  covered  with  gold,  glit- 
tering under  the  sun  of  the  deep  Syrian 
sky  throughout  all  time. 

There  is  the  Jerusalem  of  Nehemiah, 
built  with  a  weapon  of  warfare  in  one 
hand  and  an  implement  of  industry  in 
the  other,  fixed  and  serene  in  the  ever- 
lasting sky. 

There  is  the  Jerusalem  of  Isaiah,  liv- 
ing in  thought,  breathing  in  prophecy 


M/SS/ON  OF  A  GREA  T  LIFE       31 

and  falling  in  tears,  but  rising  in  aspira- 
tions that  are  never  to  pass  away. 

There  is  the  Jerusalem  of  Jeremiah, 
changing  with  the  cadences  of  his  sad 
and    mournful    poem,   but  unchanging 
and  unchangeable  in  the  fact  that  that 
poem  will  float  it  forever.      In  the  deep 
and  wailing  heart  of  the  prophet  God 
raised  up  to  tell  Jerusalem  of  her  sins, 
the  holy  city  will  sail  like  a  majestic 
ship  to  the  period  when  time  shall  be 
no  more. 

There  is  the  Jerusalem  of  Nicode- 
mus  and  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  with 
its  temple,  its  palace  of  Herod,  its  gar- 
den of  Gethsemane,  its  Mount  Calvary, 
rising  in  holiness  and  falling  in  sin,  but 
fixed  in  its  elements  and  in  its  inhabit- 
ants and  in  its  gardens  and  walls  for- 
ever in  the  literature  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment. 

Then  there  is  the  Jerusalem  of  Titus, 
caught  and  held  by  the  mind  of 
Josephus,    with  its  temple  still  stand- 


32 


HENRY  W.   GRADY 


the  most  beautiful  and  costly  structure 
ever  reared  by  the  heart  of  faith;  with 
its  doomed  people  rushing  to  and  fro, 
ready  to  die  rather  than  see  it  invaded; 
with  the  clo  id  of  battle  hanging  prt^g- 


it  with  ruin  and   fire  ab( 


it; 


)ove 

then  leveled  to  the  ground,  its  very  site 
turned  by  the  plowshare  of  the  alien. 
But  the  temple,  and  the  cloud,  and 
the  dying  defender,  and  the  smoking 
and  mouldering  ruins  will  live  on 
through  all  time  in  the  glowing  periods 
of  the  historian. 

There  is  the  Jerusalem  of  the  Cru- 
saders, filling  the  songs  of  the  gallant 
knights  and  established  in  the  wars 
and  history  and  literature  of  the  Cru- 
sades forever. 

Nothing  is  more  rational  than  the 
tribute  we  pay  to  the  lives  of  great 
men.  They  really  represent  the  his- 
tory and  toil  and  trial  and  struggle  of 
the  nations  to  which  they  belong.     It 


'    1; 


i\//SS/0.\  OF  A  GRl-A  T  LIFE      .-ja 

is  well  for  us  to  learn  that  the  States 
of  the  American  Union  are  not  to  find 
their  support  and  their  future  per- 
manence in  their  real  estate  or  in  their 
great  cities,  but  in  their  men. 

It  is  the  Massachusetts  of  Daniel 
Webster  and  not  the  Massachusetts  of 
shop  and  factory  that  will  get  a  hear- 
ing in  that  coming  republic  over  which 
no  sun  has  yet  arisen. 

It  is  the  Kentucky  of  Henry  Clay 
that  will  be  the  proud  synonym  of 
strength  when  the  Kentucky  of  fine 
horses  and  blue  grass  shall  have  been 
forgotten. 

The  South  Carolina  of  rice  and  cot- 
ton and  earthquakes  is  changing  and 
evanescent,  but  the  South  Carolina  of 
John  C.  Calhoun  is  as  imperishable  as 
the  foundations  of  God's  throne. 

It  is  not  the  Virginia  of  tobacco  and 
commercial  prosperity  that  will  be  in- 
teresting  to    the   generations  yet   un- 


34 


HENRY  II \   GRADY 


I  j  f 


born,  but  they  will  study  the  Virginia 
folded  in  the  spirits  of  Patrick  Henry 
and  Thomas  Jefferson. 

The  Illinois  of  i86i  was  not  so  rich 
in  great  cities  and  railroads  as  the  Illi- 
nois of  189C,  but  the  Illinois  of  the 
first  period  will  be  better  known  in  the 
ages  to  come,  because  it  was  fortunate 
enough  to  find  a  great  spirit  in  the  per- 
son of  Abraham  Lincoln  to  commit 
the  history  of  her  courage,  her  convic- 
tions, and  her  aspirations. 

Twenty  years  of  Southern  history, 
from  1870  to  1890,  gathered  itself 
into  the  life  of  a  young  man  about 
whose  name  there  hangs  a  charm  the 
passing  years  will  not  dispel.  Mem- 
ories that  are  dear  to  the  generation 
that  has  grown  up  since  the  war  cluster 
about  the  name  of  Henry  W.  Grady. 
His  name  is  accompanied  by  a  fra- 
grance that  refreshes  like  the  bloom  of 
spring.     It  stands  for  a  gentle  and  lov- 


MISSION  OF  A  GREA  T  LIFE      35 


ing  spirit  that  appropriated  the  melody 
of    song,    the    mystery    of   hglit,    and 
the  beauty    of    ilowers,    to   turn   them 
into      tears     for     tliose     who     wept, 
and    into    cheers   for    those   who    re- 
joiced.    It  stands  for  a  personahty  that 
was  lifted  into  historic  position  by  the 
love  of  his  countrymen,  and  which  was 
charged  with  the  high  duty  of  bearing 
to  future  generations  the  traditions  and 
hopes  and  history  of  a  great  time.    The 
recent  struggles   and   fears  and  aspira- 
tions incident  to  the  renovation  and  re- 
construction   of    the   Southern    States 
gathered  themselves  into  his  life.      It 
has  gone   from   our  view,    but   in   the 
dawning  of  days  unborn,  men  will  look 
into   that   life   to   measure   our  enter- 
prise, to  determine  our  purpose,  and  to 
sound  our  thought. 

It  was  not  by  an  unreasoning  and 
arbitrary  decision  that  from  all  our 
Southern  sons  Henry   W.  Grady  was 


i.%  I 

t:  I!]  I 


36 


IIESRY  W.   GRADY 


Mi 


1 1 


appointed  to  bear  our  greetings  and 
our  history  to  the  future.  His  spirit 
was  larf^e  and  susceptible  and  sympa- 
thetic. In  it  there  were  chords  that  re- 
sponded to  all  the  notes  in  the  life 
about  him.  In  it  the  scale  was  com- 
plete, and  notes  of  pain,  notes  of  con- 
flict, notes  of  joy,  came  back  in  song. 

*'  He  saw  on  earth  another  light 
Than  that  which  Ht  his  eye 
Come  forth,  as  from  the  soul  within, 
And  from  a  higher  sky." 

Whatever  of  commotion  and  stress 
and  friction  there  weis  without  him, 
was  turned  to  order  and  harmony  when 
it  touched  his  life.  His  spirit  beat  re- 
sponsive to  the  wants  of  all,  and  car- 
ried beneath  its  pulses  and  currents 
kinship  and  fellowship  with  all.  In  it 
the  tide  of  Southern  life  touched  the 
high- water  mark,  nnd  upon  the  shores 
of  his  genius  left  the  record  of  its  trials, 
its  achievements,    and   its   prospects. 


M/SS/ON  OF  A  GREA  T  Ul-I-       37 

Under  tlie  cover  of  his  name  they  will 
be  borne  to  the  ages  which  lie  folded 
far  out  in  unmeasured  time. 

"  Uke  a  streamer  strmvn  „p,m  tlie  «i„<l. 
We  flinK  our  s„uls  to  fate  a.ul  to  the  future. 
VVe  |,a.s.s  from  one  worl.l  f.v.sl,  into  anotluT, 
l-.e  el.auKe  l.atl,  lost  the  charm  .,f  soft  reL-ret 

A..yeel  the  i„,„.,,,a|  iu,pu,se  from  Jthh' 
Wl  „■  ,  makes  tl,e  cou,i„K  life  cry  alway.  on- 
Ai.d  follow  ,t  while  stroug,   is  heaven's    ast 
mercy. 

There  is  a  fire-Hy  in  the  south,  hut  shines 
WhenonthewiuK.     So  is't  with  mind. 
When  once 

We  rest,  we  darken.    On!  saith  God  to  the 
sunl. 

As  unto  the  earth  forever.     On  it  tjoes 

A  rejoicing  native  of  the  infinite 

As  IS  a  bird,  of  air;  an  orb,  of  heaven  " 


!J1 


r' 


'I  I' 
1^ 


i  i 


HENRY  W.  GRADY 


^be  JEDitor. 


'    t 

1 

•J       t 

\i    : 

;'  f 

!:    i 

■>     i 

fet 

"Every  man  contains  in  himself  the  ele- 
ments of  all  the  rest  of  humanity.  They  lie 
in  the  background,  but  they  are  there.  Some 
time  or  other  to  every  man  must  come  the 
consciousness  of  this  vaster  life." 

— Edward  Carpenter. 

"True  word,  kind  deed,  sweet  song  shall  vi- 
brate still 
In  rings  that  wander  through  celestial  air, 
And  human  will  shall  build  for  human  will, 
Fair  basement  to  a  palace  yet  more  fair." 

-VV.  V.  U.  Call. 

"In  man's  self  arise 
August  anticipations,  symbols,  types 
Of  a  dim  splendor  ever  on  before 
In  that  eternal  circle  life  pursues." 

— Browning. 

"  To  make  undying  music  in  the  world 
Breathing  as  beauteous  order  that  controls 
With  growing  sway  the  growing  life  of  man." 

— George  Eliot. 


'I 


■I 


CHAPTER  I. 
Henry  W.  Grady,  the  Editor. 
The  glory  of  the   mind  is  the  pos- 
session of  two   eyes,  the  eye  of  sense 
and  the  eye  of  reason.     Through  the 
one  it  looks  out  upon  the  world  of  mat- 
ter and   fact.      Through   the   other  it 
beholds  the  world  of  idee  and  relation. 
Both  worlds  are  real,  and   through  the 
niind  commerce  is    kept    up    between 
tliem.    Along  this  mental  highway  ma- 
terial facts  make   a  pilgrimage   to  the 
holy  land  of  reason.      There  they  are 
changed  into  ideas.      Stars  are  turned 
into  astronomy,  atoms  into  chemistry, 
rocks  into  geology,  and  plants  into  bot- 
any.     Over  the  same  royal  road  ideas 
pass   to   the    world    of  sense.      There 
they  are  changed  into  facts.     Ideas  of 


w 


42 


HENRY  W,   GRADY 


\ 


m 


beauty  are  changed  into  painting,  and 
Raphael's  transfiguration  blesses  the 
world.  Ideas  of  harmony  are  turned 
into  music,  and  Handel's  Messiah  agi- 
tates the  thoughts  and  hopes  of  men 
with  the  melody  of  the  skies.  Ideas 
of  form  are  changed  into  sculpture,  and 
Michael  Angelo's  Moses  augments  the 
world's  fund  of  conviction  and  courage. 
By  changing  facts  into  ideas  the 
mind  gives  us  science.  By  changing 
ideas  into  facts  it  gives  us  art.  With- 
out science  life  would  be  without  bread; 
without  art  it  would  be  without  ideals. 
Science  ministers  to  the  body,  art  to 
the  spirit.  Men  who  go  from  things 
to  ideas  are  practical;  those  who  go 
from  ideas  to  things  are  the  seers. 
Seers  throw  the  light  of  their  genius 
into  the  dark  beyond,  disclosing  new 
worlds  for  men.  They  are  the  leaders; 
they  are  in  the  vanguard  of  human 
progress.      They  believe: 


43 


THE  EDITOR 

"  New  occasions  teach  new  duties; 
Tnne  makes  ancient  ^mkkI  uncouth; 
They  must  upward  still,  and  onward, 
Who  would  keep  abreast  of  truth."  ' 

They  believe  that: 

"  Lo!  before  us  ^leani  truth's  camp  fires, 
We,  ourselves,  must  ])ilgrims  be; 
Launch  our  Mayflower,  and  steer  boldly 
Through  the  desperate  winter  sea; 
Nor  attempt  the  Future's  portal 
With  the  past's  deep-rusted  key!" 

I. 

Henry  W.    Grady  must  be  classed 
with  the  artists.      He  looked  from  the 
side  of  the  mind  that  borders  the  uni- 
verse of  ideas,    visions,  relations.      He 
was  an   idealist.      He   looked   through 
the  imagination  into   the   kingdom  of 
light.      He  saw  truth  and  beauty  and 
love    billowing   away   to   infinity.      He 
despised  not  the  world  of  hard  limita- 
tion and    fact.      But  he  found  not  his 
rest    in    it,    nor    his    inspiration.      He 
slaked  his  thirst  from  the  waters  which 
flow  from  under  the  throne  of  God. 


44 


HENRY  IV.   GRADY 


Violets  and  buttercups  which  grew 
on  the  mountain  side,  did  not  waste 
their  fragrance  as  he  passed  by,  but 
there  they  grew,  covering  with  their 
blue  and  their  beauty,  the  hills  of  day 
for  him.  Leaves  in  autumn  woods 
were  not  ignored  by  him,  but  he  culti- 
vated the  habit  of  looking  toward  the 
clime  where  the  leaves  never  die.  All 
sights  and  sounds  and  seasons  in  the 
world  of  change  and  death  were  loved 
by  him.  But  a  window  there  was  in 
his  mind  looking  into  an  illimitable 
realm  where  all  sights  brought  glad- 
ness, all  sounds  hope,  and  all  seasons 
inspiration.  That  he  was  by  endow- 
ment an  idealist,  and  by  practice  an 
artist,  is  proven  by  his  work  as  an 
editor,  his  achievements  as  an  orator, 
and  his  life  as  a  man. 


THE  EDIJOl^ 


45 


II. 

With  the  passing  years  art  has  made 
great  progress,  not  in  the  direction  of 
form,    or   coloring,   or   symmetry,    but 
toward  wider  distribution.      In  the  be- 
gnming,  its  ministry  was  to  kings  and 
scholars;  its  advance  has  been  toward 
extension  rather  than  perfection.    The 
pyramid  of  Gizeh,  the   most  expensive 
monument   ever    seen,    was   reared  to 
perpetuate    the    memory    of    a   great 
Egyptian  king.     A  country  was  drained 
of  revenue  and  life  to  regale  the  pride 
of  one   man.      The    Parthenon   minis- 
tered to  a  few  f^rreat  men   in   Greece. 
The    Cathedrals    of  the    middle    ages 
blest  and  helped  a  wider  circle.      But 
it  was  left  to  the  time  which  is  ours  to 
build  chapels   and    churches,  as  broad 
in  their  ministry  and  aims  as  the  life 
of  humanity. 

The    early    poetry   concerned  itself 


nn 


40 


HENRY  IV.   GRADY 


r>!  i 


II 


about  the  wars  of  gods  and  the  con- 
tentions of  kings.  As  the  sacredness 
of  human  hfe  came  to  be  seen,  more 
and  more  did  it  tend  to  catch  within 
the  sweep  of  its  rhythm  the  incidents 
and  traditions  and  loves  of  the  common 
people.  It  has  been  the  glory  of  our 
day  to  give  ideal  setting  to  the  '*  Old 
Oaken  Bucket  "  and  the  "  Village 
Blacksmith." 

III. 

Henry  Grady  had  the  order  of  gen- 
ius that  makes  the  artist.  The  form 
in  which  that  genius  expressed  itself 
was  determined  by  the  time  and  the 
section  in  which  he  lived.  The  corre- 
lation of  the  fine  arts  is  nearly  as  well 
accepted  as  the  correlation  of  forces. 
The  persistent  physical  force  may  ex- 
press itself  in  heat  or  light  or  electric- 
ity or  magnetism.  They  are  all  forms 
of  the  same  thing,  and  any  one  may 
pass  to  any  of  the  others. 


THE  EDITOR 


An 


Genius  is  the  persistent  mental  force 
which  expresses  itself  in  art.      It  may 
take  any  one  of  its  forms.      Music  is 
genius  in  tone.      Painting  is  genius  in 
color.      Sculpture   is   genius    in   form. 
Poetry  is  genius  in  rhythm.    Architect- 
ure is  genius  in  sublime  combination. 
Genius  of  the  highest  order  is  capable 
of  expressing  itself  in   any    or    all  of 
these.      Michael  Angelo  was  by  turns 
poet,  painter,  sculptor,   and  architect. 
The   genius    of    Henry     W.    Grady 
arose  so  far  above  the  plane  of  ordi- 
nary talent  that  it  was  capable  of  trans- 
mutation   into  any  of   the    fine    arts. 
Had  he  lived  in  the  thirteenth  century 
he  would  have  been  an  architect.    Had 
he  lived  in  the  sixteenth  and  in  Flor- 
ence he  would   have  been  a  painter. 
Had  he  lived  in  the  seventeenth  and  in 
England  he  would  have  been  a   poet. 
Living  in   the  nineteenth  and   in   the 
South  he  was  an  editor  and  an  orator. 


m 


4S 


//ICXRV  IV.   GRADY 


ii 


Ifi 


m 


In  thought  and  spirit  he  Hved  in  the 
boundless,  the  radiant,  the  beautiful. 
He  saw  visions  as  fair  as  Rubens's, 
and  temples  as  perfect  as  that  of  Phid- 
ias. But  his  genius  was  controlled 
by  his  heart. 

"  His  genius  was  not  a  tiling  apart, 
A  i)illarcd  hermit  of  the  hrain 
Hoarding  with  incommunicable  art 
Its  intellectual  gain." 

His  sympathy  for  men  was  so  con- 
stant and  so  universal  that  it  denied 
his  genius  expression  in  forms  which 
only  touched  the  few.  His  love  im- 
pelled his  thought  to  expression  as 
wide  as  the  needs,  as  deep  as  the  suf- 
fering, and  as  complex  as  the  interests 
and  relations  of  his  fellow-men.  A 
temple  embodying  his  genius  would 
not  have  given  him  so  much  pleasure 
as  a  poor  man's  heart  made  happy 
by  it. 

Hence,   without,   perhaps,   thinking 


THE  EDITOR 


49 


so.  unconsciously  he  selected  that 
niodiuni  tliroii/^di  which  to  express 
the  ideas  of  beauty,  truth  and  good- 
ness which  he  saw  that  had  the  wid- 
est flow. 

What  instrument   permitted  him  to 
touch    most    people  ?      In    what    way 
could   he  get   into   relation  with  most 
human  want  ?     What  touched  man  on 
most  sides  of  his  character  and  stimu- 
lated most  thought  and  provoked  most 
endeavor  ?    It  was  the  age  of  the  news- 
paper.     It  liew  into  every  man's  home 
and  carried  a  message  to  every  man's 
thought.     Into  the  newspaper  he  would 
breathe    his    message.       Through  the 
newspaper  he  would  tell  to  men  the 
visions  which  he  saw  of  hope  and  help 
and  inspiration.      Not  for  money  did  he 
write — not  for  money  did  he  care,  but 
througli  writing  would  he  make  his  life 
contribution    to    human     weal.      The 
newspaper  became  his  brush  and  let- 


: 


50 


IIEXRY  \V.   GRADY 


ters  became  his  pif^^ments.  Through 
these  he  determined  to  make  known 
what  he  felt  for  men  and  what  he 
wished  for  men.  He  had  genius  to 
embody;  he  had  pictures  to  paint. 
The  South  was  his  canvas.  Upon 
this  broad  section  he  would  embody 
what  he  saw. 

By  going  to  every  man's  home  with 
a  message,  stimulating  and  beautiful, 
he  would  stir  his  heart  and  move  his 
will.  Thus  through  men  he  would 
embody  all  over  the  South  the  ideas 
which  he  saw.  He  would  put  them 
into  fields  of  waving  grain.  He  would 
put  them  into  cattle  upon  every  hill. 
He  would  put  them  into  a  home  for 
every  family.  Around  every  home  he 
would  plant  orchards  and  vineyards. 
Over  every  door  he  would  trace  vines 
and  flowers.  In  the  centers  of  popu- 
lation he  would  put  great  cities,  for 
distribution    and    for    help.      Thus    he 


\ 


////•;  EDI  TOR 


61 


would  paint  a  picture  standinfj  over 
men  and  under  men  and  blessing;  men. 
A  panorama  filled  with  the  actual 
things  men  need,  rather  than  the  rep- 
resentation of  these  to  hang  in  great 
museums. 

Before  he  left  college  he  delivered  a 
speech  entitled  "  Castles  of  Fancy." 
He  painted  an  island  beautiful  for  sit- 
uation, embraced  by  the  mild  waters 
of  a  friendly  sea.  This  was  covered 
with  residences  handsome  and  inviting. 
In  these  lived  families  without  care  and 
without  want.  This  was  the  vision  he 
had  for  his  loved  South.  Through  the 
daily  newspaper  he  sent  it,  with  his 
love  to  all  our  people.  They  responded 
to  the  truth  he  uttered.  He  saw  his 
beloved  section  rising  from  the  desola- 
tion of  war  to  independence  and  wealth. 
He  found  his  compensation  in  watch- 
ing and  recording  her  progress. 

No  Diana  or  Venus  did  he  attempt 


w 


it 


i'     ! 


'i" 


A3 


///:A7v'}'  //'.    (;A\I/)\' 


to  l)rin;^^  from  r()ii;^^h  marble,  but  by 
hnin^^  word  to  put  thu  bciuity  of  Venus 
and  the  enterprise  of  Diana  into  every 
sister,  mc^tluT  and  wife.  No  sublime 
conception  did  he  seek  to  realize  in 
tem])le  or  cathedral,  but  he  would  see 
his  conception  distributed  and  lifted 
into  a  dwellin^^  for  every  man's  fainily, 
a  school  for  every  man's  children,  and 
a  chur(  h  where  all  the  jieople  could 
worship  God.  He  would  see  them  in 
brid^'es  spanning  every  river,  in  mills 
grinding  the  people's  bread,  in  facto- 
ries spinning  their  clothes,  and  in  rail- 
roads transporting  their  products.     He 

would  see  them  lifted  into  an  asylum 
for  the  blind,  a  shelter  for  the  orphan, 

and  a  home  where  the  veteran  could 
could  spend  in  peace  his  declining  years. 
Ideas  of  harmony  he  had,  but  he 
would  see  them  turned  into  the  whirr 
of  the  spindle,  the  ring  of  the  ham- 
mer, the  splash  of  the  steamer's  wheel 


I 


J 


THE  EDITOR 


.% 


and  the  sound  of  the  flying  train.  The 
music  of  children's  hiughter  was 
sweeter  to  him  than  symphonies  of 
Beethoven. 

Ideas  of   poetry   he   doubtless   had, 
but  he  would  translate  them   into  the 
steady  march  of  pro^Tess.  and  into  the 
pulsebeats  of  the  happy  plowman. 
•      Let  it  not  be  thought  that  he  sought 
nothing  beyond  the  realization  of  his 
genius   in   the   material   upbuilding   of 
his  section.      Because  of  the  col  lition 
the   South   was   in   after  the  war  this 
was  most  pressing  and  imuKdiate.     He 
would   put   truth    in   every    mind,    the 
flowers    of    charity    in    every    heart, 
honor  and   fairness  in  every  relation, 
and  the  consolation  of  religion  in  every 
spirit.      Nor  is  it  to  be  supposed  that 
he  was  indifferent  to  the  advancement 
of  other  sections  of  our  great  country, 
but  the  greatest  need  was  in  his  own.' 
While  cherishing  nought  but  love  and 


54 


HENRY  W.   GRADY 


H;,' 


% 


good  will  for  all,  his  aim  was  to  con- 
tribute toward  bringing  the  South  to  a 
level  with  other  sections  of  the  Union 
in  wealth,  as  it  had  always  been  in 
character  and  honor. 

Did  ever  man  have  ambition  nobler 
than  to  lift  his  countrymen  from  want 
to  plenty,  from  dejection  to  hope, 
from  n  isunderstanding  to  love  and 
charity  ?  Did  ever  fairer,  lovelier 
vision  float  before  artist's  eye  from  out 
the  sky  of  the  ineffable  to  be  thrown 
into  form  sublimer,  or  poem  kinder,  or 
music  sweeter  ? 

He  used  beauty  to  stimulate  human 
courage,  to  embellish  human  spirit,  to 
enlarge  lumian  thought.  His  concep- 
tions gathered  themselves  into  clothes 
for  human  forms,  into  bread  for  chil- 
dren's mouths,  into  inspiration  for  hu- 
man hearts.  He  was  God's  almoner. 
Freely  he  received,  freely  he  gave. 

Counted  by  years  his  life  was  not 


THE  EDITOR 


55 


long,  but  it  is  my  honest  convictior 
that  he  got  more  of  heaven's  wealth 
into  his  time,  and  more  of  heaven's 
hope  and  joy  into  the  hearts  of  his 
countrymen  than  any  man  of  his  day. 
He  drove  out  more  of  hfe's  shadows 
by  the  light  of  eternity's  day,  and 
hushed  more  of  its  tumult  by  the  re- 
pose of  eternity's  truth  than  any  man 
of  his  time. 

"His  magic  was  not  far  to  seek— 

He  was  so  Iiiinian  !  whether  strong  or  weak. 

Far  from  his  kind  he  neither  sank  nor  soared, 

Bnt  sate  an  equal  guest  at  every  board. 

No  beggar  ever  felt  him  condescend. 

No  prince  presume;  for  still  himself   lie  bare 

At  manhood's  simple  level,  and  where'er 

He  met  a  stranger,  there  he  left  a  friend." 

IV. 

It  is  the  conceit  of  those  whose 
habit  of  mind  is  to  look  through  the 
eye  of  sense  that  they  see  more  in  the 
actual  tangible  world  than  those  who 
are  accustomed  to  look  through  the  eye 


56 


HENRY  IV.  GRADY 


W 


of  reason.  There  never  was  a  greater 
mistake.  Those  who  see  most  in  the 
world  of  mountain  and  sea  and  sky, 
are  those  who  look  most  through  im- 
agination into  the  world  of  idea  princi- 
ple and  relation. 

Adams  in  England,  and  Leverrier  in 
France,  discovered  Neptune,  not  by 
sweeping  the  heavens  with  their  tele- 
scopes, but  by  careful  ciphering  in  their 
studies.  "  Mr.  Turner,"  said  a  friend 
one  day  to  him,  "  I  never  see  in  nature 
the  glows  and  colors  you  put  into  your 
pictures."  "Ah!  don't  you  wish  you 
could,  though  ?  "  was  the  painter's  re- 
ply. In  an  apple's  fall  Newton  saw 
the  law  of  gravitation.  Goethe  sees  in 
the  sections  of  a  deer's  skull  the  spinal 
column  modified.      Emerson  sings: 

"  Let  me  go  where  I  will 
I  hear  a  sky  born  nuisic  still. 
'Tis  not  in  the  stars  alone. 
Nor  in  the  cups  of  budding  flowers, 
Nor  in  the  red-breast's  yellow  tone, 


1^ 


THE  EDITOR  57 

Nor  in  the  bow  that  smiles  in  showers, 
But  in  the  mud  and  scum  of  thinj^s— 
There  always,  always,  something  sings." 

Humboldt  habitually  dwelt  in  the 
realm  of  principles  and  ideas.  He  spent 
only  five  years  in  America,  and  it  took 
twelve  quartos  and  sixteen  folios,  and 
half  a  dozen  helpers  and  many  years  to 
put  on  record  what  he  saw. 

"  The  poem  hangs  on  the  berry  bush 
When  comes  the  poet's  eye; 
The  street  is  one  long  masciuerade 
When  Shakspeare  passes  by." 

It  is  said  that  Thoreau,  the  idealist, 
saw  facts  as  one  picks  buttercups  and 
daisies  in  the  field.  The  literahst  sees 
only  the  fact,  the  idealist  sees  the  idea 
in  the  fact  and  beyond  the  fact. 

That  Henry  W.  Grady  was  an  ideal- 
ist, that  he  lived  close  by  the  clime  of 
eternal  realities,  and  looked  out  upon 
the  stars  which  never  go  down;  that  he 
revelled  in  the  light  which  comes  from 
the  sun  which  knows  no  sinking;   that 


'■■  !■    i 


T 


5S 


HENRY  W.  GRADY 


m 


he  kept  up  constant  commerce  with  the 
enchanted  land  of  beauty,  is  attested  by 
the  aroma  that  accompanied  his  words, 
and  the  suggestions  of  boundlessness 
and  wealth  which  they  always  called 
forth. 

Was  he  less  practical  because  of  this  ? 
He  was  more.  Was  he  further  from 
the  real  world  of  suffering  and  toil  be- 
cause of  this.-^     He  was  nearer  to  it. 

He  heard  the  music  in  the  mud  and 
scum  of  things. 

V. 

He  was  one  of  the  first  to  call  at- 
tention to  the  wealth  of  our  mountains. 
In  a  speech  delivered  some  years  ago 
he  told  of  a  burial  in  Pickens  county, 
Georgia.  He  said  the  grave  was  dug 
through  solid  marble,  but  the  marble 
headstone  wac  ^toiv\  Vermont.  That 
it  was  in  a  pine  wilderness,  but  the 
pine    cof^n     came    frem     Cincinnati. 


THE  EDITOR 


59 


That  an  iron  mountain  over-shadowed 
it,     but    the    coffin    nails    and   screws 
came     from      Pittsburg.      That      hard 
woods  and   metals  abounded,   but   the 
corpse  was   hauled  on  a  wagon  from 
South  Bend,  Indiana.     That  a  hickory 
grove  was  near  by,  but  the  pick   and 
shovel  handles  came  from  New  York. 
That  the  cotton  shirt  on  the  dead  man 
came  from   Cincinnati,    the  coat   and 
breeches  from  Chicago,   and  the  shoes 
from    Boston.      That  the  folded  hands 
were    incased    in   white  gloves    which 
came  from  New  York,  and  around  the 
poor  neck  that  had  worn  all  its  living 
days  the  bondage  of  lost  opportunity 
was  twisted  a  cheap  cravat  from  Phil- 
adelphia.     That  the    country,   so  rich 
in    undeveloped    resources,     furnished 
nothing  for  the  funeral   but  the  poor 
man's  body  and  the  grave  in  which  it 
awaited    the    judgment    trump.      And 
that   the    poor   fellow   lowered    to    his 


00 


HENRY  n\  GRADY 


rest  on  coffin  bands  from  Lowell  car- 
ried nothing  into  the  next  world  as  a 
reminder  of  his  home  in  this,  save  the 
halted  blood  in  his  veins,  the  chilled 
marrow  in  his  bones,  and  the  echo  of 
the  dull  clods  that  fell  on  his  coffin 
lid. 

The  attention  of  the  people  he  di- 
rected to  the  marble  in  our  mountains, 
and  lived  to  see  $3,000,000  invested 
in  marble  quarries  and  machinery 
around  that  grave.  Twenty  miles 
from  that  grave  he  lived  to  see  the 
largest  marble-cutting  works  in  the 
world. 

He  called  attention  to  the  iron  in 
our  mines,  and  helped  to  lift  the  iron 
industries  of  the  South  to  rivalry  with 
those  in  England  and  the  North.  He 
saw  it  advance  from  212,000  tons  in 
1880  to  the  production  of  845,000  in 
1887. 

He  called  attention  to  the  immense 


■:i  :  • 


I 
I 


THE  EDITOR 


61 


fund  of  heat  God  had  stored  away  for 
us  when  he  laid  the  foundations  of  the 
world.  He  helped  to  swell  the  min- 
ing industry  from  3,000,000  tons  of 
coal  in  1870  to  6,000,000  in  1880,  and 
nearly  i  5,000,000  tons  in  1887. 

He  saw  not  only  the  coal  and  iron, 
but  the  uses  coming  together  to  which 
they  might  be  turned.      He  saw  their 
relation  to  human  comfort  and  to  civil- 
ization, and  under  the  influence  of  his 
enthusiasm  expressed  in  brilliant  edi- 
torial through  his  pen,  there  was  built 
some  of  the  largest  furnaces  and  foun- 
dries in  the  world.     To  bring  this  raw 
material  of  iron  and  wood  a  little  way 
from  the  mountain  and  the  forest  did 
not  satisfy  him.      He  wished  to  see  it 
carried  through   nail  factories,   shovel 
and  pick  factories,  carriage  and  wagon 
factories,  on  the  spot.      He  wished  to 
see  it  made  ready  for  use  and  started 
from   our    doors    upon    the    rounds   of 


," 


03 


HENRY  W.  GRADY 


li 


trade..  He  urged  the  application  of 
intelligence  to  raw  material  in  bridge 
works,  car  works,  chain  works,  mill 
works  and  hinge  works. 

He  saw  the  possibilities  of  Southern 
soil.  In  the  elements  which  compose 
it,  the  genial  skies  above  it,  and  the 
dews  which  come  out  of  the  night 
upon  it;  he  saw  watermelons,  straw- 
berries, cherries,  grapes,  pears,  peaches, 
and  all  fruits  and  foods.  His  editorials 
on  truck  farming  were  prose  poems. 
They  carried  hope  and  courage  to  the 
Southern  farmer. 


VI. 

He  idealized  the  Georgia  water- 
melon. The  blossom  that  bore  it,  the 
vine  that  nourished  it,  and  the  planter 
that  protected  it.  In  flavor,  in  beauty, 
in  haste  to  get  ripe,  he  helped  it  to  the 
first  place  in  the  markets  of  the  world. 
After  reading  one  of  his  editorials  on 


THE  EDITOR 


68 


the  watermelon,  it  could  be  seen  lying 
green  and  dew-covered  in  the  patch, 
with  contents  sweet  enough  for  the 
table  of  a  king. 

He  aided  the  Southern  strawberry  to 
herald  first  in  Northern  markets  the 
coming  spring. 

The  Southern  peach  he  made  classic. 

He  swelled  its  power  to  delight  with  its 

meat,  and  to  suggest  with  its  painted 

cheek  the  soft  skies   under  which    it 

grew. 

He  made  the  Southern  ground-pea 
a  wanderer  round  the  world  and  helped 
it  to  advertise  our  section  from  the 
pea-nut  stands  of  all  countries. 

He  loved  the  cotton  plant.  In  no 
poet's  esteem  did  ever  rose  or  hyacinth 
or  violet  stand  higher.  Its  blossom 
opening  its  leaves  of  white  to  catch 
scarlet  from  the  down-flowing  light, 
revealed  the  birth  of  a  king.  It  was 
interesting  to  him  because  of  its  rela- 


64 


IIEXRV  IK  GRADV 


\\\ 


tion  to  human  comfort  and  use.  He 
loved  it  because  it  caught  so  much  of 
heaven's  sunshine  for  man's  use.  It 
appropriated  in  the  South  every  year 
from  sky  and  ray  enough  cloth  to  pro- 
tect with  a  suit  of  clothes  every  human 
being  on  earth.  He  saw  more  in  it 
than  its  lint.  He  proved  that  though 
the  South  received  $350,000,000  for  its 
7,000,000  bales  of  cotton,  that  it  would 
be  a  valuable  plant  though  it  gave 
no  lint  at  all.  That  after  the  3,000,- 
000,000  pounds  of  lint  was  sold  for  the 
$350,000,000,  there  was  left  3,750,000 
tons  of  seed.  That  this  would  supply 
150,000,000  gallons  of  oil,  which,  sold 
at  forty  cents  a  gallon,  would  bring 
$60,000,000.  Or  that  it  might  be  re- 
duced to  lard,  when  it  would  produce 
1,125,000,000  pounds  of  edible  fat. 
which  would  equal  in  pounds  5,625,000 
hogs  of  200  pounds  each.  Allowing  200 
pounds  of  edible  fat  to  each  person  per 


t:ii^ 


THE  EDITOR 


65 


It 


annum,    he   showed    that    this    would 
keep  in  meat  5,625,000  citizens. 

But  he  saw  still  more  in  the  wonder- 
ful cotton  plant.      He  proved  that  after 
the  seeds  are   stripped   of  lint  and  the 
oil  pressed  from  the  seeds,  that  there 
remained  of  each  ton  of  seeds    1,000 
pounds   of    hulls    and    750    pounds  of 
meal;  that  this  meal  and  hulls  was  un- 
equaled   as   a   fertilizer,   of  which  the 
cotton  crop  of  the  South  would  yield 
3,000,000  tons;   that  the  meal  was  also 
the  very  best  food  for  cattle  and  sheep, 
and   fed    to   either  produced   meat  or 
wool.      He  showed  that  it  would  fur- 
nish   6,586,500,000    pounds    of   stock 
food— enough   to  stall-feed   1,175,000 
for  one  year,   and  that  these  in  turn 
would  furnish  meat  for  6,000,000  more 
people. 

Whatever  he  wrote  was  colored  and 
magnetized  by  the  hue  and  subtle  force 
of  his  own  personality. 


CO 


HENRY  IV.  GRADY 


'^ 


■  ;■'■ 


!ii- 


He  wrapped  our  mountains  in  the 
glow  of  his  f^cnius,  and  sent  the  hght 
of  his  thought  through  the  structure  of 
our  mineral  formations,  and  invited 
millions  of  money  to  the  establishment 
of  mills  and  foundries  to  work  them. 

He  bathed  our  forests  in  the  purple 
and  pink  and  gold  of  his  imagination 
and  disclosed  the  value  of  our  timber, 
and  thus  invited  people  to  erect  spoke 
and  hub  and  ax -handle  factories  all 
through  the  Southern  states. 

He  laid  the  bars  and  lines  of  his  ex- 
quisite imagery  on  the  hills  and  valleys 
of  our  farms,  and  with  graceful  pencil- 
ings  of  light  from  the  boundless  re- 
sources of  his  mind  worked  traceries 
with  the  vines  over  the  doors  of  our 
country  homes  and  advertised  the 
charm  of  rural  dwelling  places. 


in   the 

;  light 

lire  of 

nvited 

iment 

2  in. 

oiirple 

lation 

ruber, 

spoke 

3S   all 

is  ex- 
illeys 
2ncil- 
s  re- 
;eries 
P  our 

thr 


HENRY  W.  GRADY 

^be  ©rator. 


"  What  might  be  done,  if  men  were  wise — 
What  glorious  deeds,  my  suffering  brother, 

Would  they  unite 

In  love  and  right, 
And  cease  their  scorn  of  one  another  ? 

'*  Oppression's  heart  might  be  imbued 
With  kindling  drops  of  loving  kindness, 

And  knowledge  pour 

From  shore  to  shore, 
Light  on  the  eyes  of  mental  blindness. 

"  The  meanest  wretch  that  ever  trod, 
The  deepest  sunk  in  guilt  and  sorrow. 

Might  stand  erect 

In  self-respect, 
And  share  the  teeming  world  to-morrow. 

"  What  might  be  done  ?    This  might  be  done, 
And  more  tiian  this,  my  suffering  brother — 

More  than  the  tongue 

E'er  said  or  sung. 
If  men  were  wise  and  lov'd  each  other." 

Charles  Mackay. 


ise — 
ther, 


done, 
;r — 


:ay. 


CHAPTER  II. 
Henry  W.  Gradv,  the  Orator. 

As  an   orator  Mr.  Grady  sought,  by 
spoken   word  and  direct  appeal,  more 
immediately    to   accomplish   what   en- 
gaged his  attention   as  an   editor.      To 
hnihl    up     his    section    in    wealth,    to 
quicken    its    enterprise    and   widen   its 
outlook,  was  ever  his  aim  as  editor  or 
orator.      As  an  orator  he  was  without 
an  equal  among  Southern   men  of  the 
younger  generation. 

On  the  rostrum  he  was  a  master. 
He  had  action,  pathos,  fervor.  In 
gesture,  in  manner,  he  was  grace 
itself.  Never  did  the  artist  in  him  re- 
veal itself  more  clearly  than  in  one  of 
liis  great  speeches.      He   was  the  em- 


iii  i: 


I  U  I'.' 

,1' 


ro 


HENRY  ir.   GRADY 


bodimcnt  of  strength,  unity  and  beauty. 
The  multitudes  hung  upon  his  hps  en- 
tranced. A  hving  man  had  come  to 
talk  upon  living  issues,  in  words  ex- 
quisitely chosen,  in  sentences  marvel- 
ously  wrought,  and  out  of  a  heart 
overflowing  with  sympathy  and  good 
will. 

His  message  was  magnetized  and 
baptized  by  a  personality  that  con- 
quered without  effort.  Straight  to  the 
heart  it  went,  mingling  with  the  blood 
and  assimilating  the  thought.  It  cap- 
tured and  held  in  the  most  magical  way, 
imagination  and  reason  and  conviction. 
To  hear  his  words  as  they  fell  from 
the  chambers  of  his  imagery,  shot 
through  with  the  colors  of  his  own 
soul,  and  filled  with  the  truth  he  had 
to  utter,  was  absolutely  delightful. 
They  united  hearts  by  a  spell  and 
made  them  the  speaker's  own. 


THE  ORATOR 


71 


•eauty. 
ips  en- 
•me  to 
ds  ex- 
larvel- 
heart 
good 

I    and 
con- 
to  the 
blood 
cap- 
'  way, 
ction. 
from 
shot 
own 
I  had 
itful. 
and 


I. 

Out  of  a  few  colors  Rubens  manu- 
factured the  radiant  visions  which  il- 
lumine the  great  galleries  of  Europe. 
So  Mr.  Grady  had  ability  to  multiply 
what  he  saw  through  the  eye  of  sense 
by  the  imagination.  A  scale  became 
a  fish,  a  leaf  a  tree,  and  a  few  sounds 
a  symphony. 

In  1870  he  saw  the  actual  South, 
poor,  dispirited  and  desolate.  But  as 
the  perturbations  of  Uranus  suggested 
to  Adams  the  existence  and  orbit  of 
Neptune,  her  very  poverty  and  desola- 
tion suggested  the  wealth  and  the 
beauty  which  slept  in  her  bosom.  To 
bid  this  wealth  step  forth  from  its  hid- 
ing place  and  mingle  this  beauty  with 
the  purposes  and  hopes  of  her  people 
was  his  work  as  an  orator. 

An  invisible  furnace  stood  by  every 
iron  mine,  an  invisible  wagon  factory 


i\ 


72 


HENRY  IV.  GRADY 


Ml 


by  every  hickory  grove,  an  invisible 
cotton  mill  by  every  field.  It  was  his 
work  to  make  these  ghosts  take  form. 
He  was  an  idealist,  but  his  ideals  were 
workable  and  transferable.  Like  the 
engine  that  moved  out  of  Watt's  brain 
to  revolutionize  the  world,  and  like 
the  telephone  that  moved  out  of  Bell's 
brain  to  make  us  neighbors,  the  ideals 
which  Mr.  Grady  had  were  useful. 
They  could  hammer  and  spin  and 
weave.  They  could  build  railroads, 
clear  forests  and  remove  mountains. 

They  were  not  dainty,  nor  pale,  nor 
thin.  They  were  robust  and  hearty. 
They  were  in  line  with  the  laws  of 
gravity  and  the  drift  of  events.  The 
stars  in  their  courses  helped  them  for- 
ward. 

Whether  they  ripened  ui  the  straw- 
berries red,  or  hung  in  the  wheat's  yel- 
low sheaf,  or  sweetened  in  the  water- 


THE  ORATOR  73 

melon's  heart,  they  were  ever  human 
and  helpful. 

Whether  they  hung  in  vines  over  the 
poor  man's  door,  or  turned  in  the  car 
wheels  of  commerce,  or  remained  for 
cheer  and  hope  in  the  school-boy's 
breast,  they  were  infusing  purpose  and 
urging  forward. 

Whether  they  lifted  themselves  up 
into  a  Young  Men's  Christian  Associa^ 
tion,  or  did  their  work  in  a  veteran's 
home,  or  stirred  a  city  to  help  the 
poor,  they  were  the  same  lofty  and  gen- 
erous ideals.  They  cheered  and  stimu- 
lated like  music. 

They  started  the  feelings  in  larger 
How,  and  the  thoughts  on  wider  circles, 
and  the  will  to  higher  aims. 

To  him  the  heart  of  the  South  was  a 
lute   which   for   many  years   had  been 
nuite,  but  whereon  he  learned  to  play. 
"  He  took  it,  and  touched  it,  and  made 


111! 


74 


HENRY  li:   GRADY 


it  thrill,  and  it  thrills  and  throbs  and 
quivers  still." 

II. 

Grady  had  a  soul  full  of  music.  He 
used  his  power  as  an  orator  to  play  it 
to  the  people.  He  piped  in  strains 
high  and  accents  low.  He  sent  it  from 
him  in  march  and  w^altz,  in  plantation 
melody  and  cathedral  hymn,  in  child's 
song  and  battle-strain.  He  sought 
through  his  oration  to  strike  all  the 
notes  of  the  orchestra. 

He  used  it  as  a  flute  to  play  a  sad 
night  song;  as  guitar  for  minstrelsy  as 
genial  as  the  light;  as  violin  for  strains 
which  made  the  blood  tingle,  or  as 
organ  to  move  the  people  with  solemn 
swell  to  great  action. 

He  varied  his  instrument  according 
to  the  character  of  the  music  he  had  to 
give.  Sometimes  the  banjo  helped  him 
best  to  express  the  sportive  jingle  he 


THE   ORATOR 


7.") 


)bs  and 


c.     He 

play  it 

strains 

it  from 

.ntation 

:  child's 
sought 

all  the 

J  a  sad 

relsy  as 

strains 

or    as 

solemn 

cording 
;  had  to 
)ed  him 
ngle  he 


^elt.  In  one  form  or  another  his 
melody  created  a  stir  and  tumult  in  the 
souls  i){  all  tlie  people. 
.  The  bank  president  felt  it  forcing  the 
atmosphere  of  his  office  into  rhythmic 
waves,  and  disposing  his  heart  to 
sweeter  moods. 

The  railway  engineer  recognized  it, 
synchronizing  with  the  orderly  throb  of 
his  sublime  machine  and  taking  away 
his  thought  to  loved  ones  at  home. 

The  farmer  heard  it,  breaking  over 
the  hills,  mingling  with  the  winds  that 
kept  in  constant  undulation  the  leaves 
of  his  corn  and  responded  with  the 
whistle  of  cheer  and  hope. 

The  sewing  woman  perceived  it 
moving  the  solitary  air  of  her  room  to 
quicker  vibrations,  and  stitched  away 
with  lighter  spirit. 

The  country  boy  caught  it,  and  found 
himself  going  off  in  aspiration  for  a 
nobler  life. 


70 


HENRY  IV.  GKADV 


Wi 


The  negro  on  the  plantation  was 
agitated  by  it,  and  was  moved  into 
hmnniing  some  song  he  loved. 

The  poor  tramp,  homeless  and  bread- 
less  and  friendless,  found  it  throwing 
around  his  lonely  heart  a  warmer 
climate,  and  thought  of  his  mother  and 
the  time  when  a  little  innocent  boy  he 
stood  by  her  side. 

He  was  irresistible;  refractory,  stub- 
born, unlovable,  hard  men  found  it 
difficult  to  resist  just  a  slight  tinge  of 
tenderness  as  the  waves  of  Grady's 
music  piled  in  successive  layers  around 
their  unsympathetic  lives. 

Stingy  men  who  seemingly  could 
have  faced  death  with  more  com- 
posure than  the  sense  of  obligation  to 
contribute  a  cent,  felt  in  spite  of  them- 
selves the  purse  strings  in  their  deep 
pockets  slightly  relaxing  as  they  lis- 
tened to  the  music  of  Grady's  appeal. 

Conservative  people  who  take  unc- 


on  was 
id    into 

bread- 
rowing 
Vtirnier 
icr  and 
boy  he 

',  stiib- 
•und  it 
inge  of 
jrady's 
iround 

could 
com- 
:ion  to 
them- 
deep 
3y  lis- 
ppeal. 
I  unc- 


77//-;   ORATOR  77 

tion  to   themselves  for  never  making 
a    mistake,    who    regard    their   stupid 
"idividualities   with    undisturbed  com- 
placency because  they  never  invest  in 
patents,  or  read  poetry.,  or  buy  books 
could  not  keep  their  slow  moving  blood 
from  getting  into  a  quicker  movement 
when  the  notes  of  Grady's  music  came 
up  aganist  their  diminutive  spirits. 

III. 

To  be  a  great  orator  it  is  necessary  to 
have  a  clear,  distinct    message  to  ut- 
ter.     There  was  hidden  in  the  life  of 
Henry   W.    Grady  the   detentions  and 
suggestions  of  a  glad  literature.      It  was 
an  original  quotation  fron.  an  eternal 
source  that  managed  to  get  itself  into 
the   syntax    and    prosody   of    orations 
which  kindled  a  new.  wide  and  kindly 
hght  m  twenty  years  of  solemn  time. 

Never  did  message  from  the  illimita- 
ble sources  of  thought  and  life  come  to 


^m 


78 


UEXRY  ll\   URADV 


^ 


lU 


men  at  a  more  ()|)portune  moment. 
The  section  which  j^^ave  (irady  birth 
had  been  (hsorj^^anized  and  dismantled 
by  the  conllicts  of  war.  The  Southern 
people  were  poor  and  downhearted, 
oppressed  by  the  burden  of  defeat,  and 
faced  by  the  complications  of  nntried 
problems.  The  sun  of  the  Southern  re- 
public, which  promised  so  much  in  its 
rising  effulgence,  had  just  gone  down. 
The  afterglow  arising  from  the  sense  of 
honor  unsullied,  and  from  the  assur- 
ance of  duty  faithfully  performed,  kept, 
it  is  true,  the  horizon  of  the  sinking 
confederacy  red  for  a  long  time  after 
the  echo  of  the  last  gun  had  died  away. 
But  the  brilliant  display  of  pink  bars 
of  cloud,  and  orange  flush  of  haze, 
shot  into  the  western  sky  of  the  failing 
Southern  republic  from  the  heroism  of 
Jackson  and  the  courage  of  Lee,  and 
the  sacrifice  of  brave  men  and  the  de- 
votion of  tender  women,  could  not  keep 


THE  ORATOR 


79 


the  shadow  lines  from   falling  across 
the  pageantry  of  glorious  color. 

Around  the  afterglow  of  vcrmillion 
and  purple   and    green,    there    was    a 
fringe  of  night  which  threatened,  inch 
by  inch,  to  close  in  a  curtain  of  chirk- 
ness.     At  a  time  like  this,  Grady  began 
to  find  in  the  folds  of  his  glowing  young 
h'fe   the    alphabet   of    the  doctrine    of 
hope.      Preliminary   lessons    from  the 
hterature  of  his   mission   he  began  to 
get.      He  was  to  call  the  attention  of 
the   Southern    people   fnjm  the  after- 
glow of  the  sinking  Confederacy,  with 
its  sad  beauty  of  reminiscence  and  de- 
parting vision. 

He  had  seen  the  red  streaks  of  a 
dawn  which  betokened  the  interior 
splendors  of  a  grander  day.  Up  the 
Eastern  horizon  he  saw  arising  the 
wondrous  foregleams  of  a  great  future. 
Under  the  stimulus  of  this  light  from 
the  frontiers  of  new  time,  the  letters  in 


80 


IIEXRY  ir.  GRADY 


his  living'  spirit  began  to  gather  them- 
selves into  words,  and  the  words  into 
sentences,  and  tlie  sentences  to  get 
filled  with  a  meaning  it  became  the 
passion  of  his  life  to  make  known. 

Phlegmatic,  low-keyed  people,  com- 
ing in  contact  with  the  boundless  op- 
timism of  Grady,  said  he  was  visionary, 
and  that  his  enterprises  would  not  suc- 
ceed. That  class  of  men  who  are 
too  stupid  to  think  and  too  cowardly  to 
get  out  of  the  beaten  track,  and  too 
stingy  to  spend  a  cent  on  a  promising 
experiment,  always  predict  failure  to 
the  originality  that  dares  to  live  and 
breathe  under  the  burning  sun.  They 
would  expect  the  honeysuckles  to  fail 
because  they  are  so  gay,  and  happy, 
and  red,  were  they  not  assured  by  pre- 
cedent, the  only  logic  they  compre- 
hend, that  they  have  been  blooming 
for  ages. 

While   wise  and    conservative    and 


I 


7///f  OR  A  TON 


8t 


thoin- 
Is  into 

to    f^ct 

le  tliu 

n. 

,  coin- 

ss  op- 

3nary, 

)t  siic- 

0  arc 
dly  to 
d  too 
nisin«( 
ire  to 
2  and 
They 
;o  fail 

appy. 

1  pre- 
npre- 
•ming 

and 


slow  men  were  rin/-inf(  the  chan^'es  on 
the  doctrine  that  the  South  was  get- 
ting  poorer  and  poorer  every  day, 
Grady  with  his  orations  and  editorials 
was  waking  up  his  section  and  bringing 
a  new  invoice  of  blood  to  the  hearts  of 
her  people. 

IV. 

In  1889  he  was  invited  to  deliver  an 
address  upon  the  occasion  of  the  New 
England    dinner    in     New    York,    on 
"  The  New  South. "     The  surroundings 
were  complicated.      Demonstrations  in 
honor    of   Jefferson    Davis    had    been 
credited  to  the  remains  of  the  spirit  of 
rebellion.     How  the  South  could  honor 
its  living  heroes,  and  cover  with  flow- 
ers the  graves  of  its  sleeping  dead,  and 
yet  be  loyal  to  the  liag,  and  in  sym- 
pathy with  the  Union,  was  not  under- 
stood. 

The  crossing  of  swords  by  editors  of 


82 


///wWv'l'  //:   GRADY 


i! 

vX 


different  sections  had  kept  the  air  full 
of  nnsunderstandin^j^s  and  misinterpre- 
tation.s.  Thus  to  be  called  to  speak  of 
the  South  to  such  a  company,  and 
under  such  conditions,  while  an  honor, 
was  attended  with  j^rave  perils.  Mr. 
Grady  reco^mized  the  delicacy  of  ttie 
position,  and  accepted  the  responsi- 
bility. H"  had  li\c(l  lon<;  enou<;h  to 
lorni  for  himself  a  conception  of  the 
South.  He  understood  her  resources, 
the  hearts,  and  motives,  of  her  people. 
He  had  imbibed  from  her  genial  skies, 
and  learned  from  her  lovin^^  sons,  and 
cau;;ht  from  her  suffering  and  her  trials 
lessons  which  went  to  make  the  con- 
ception complete.  It  was  not  over- 
drawn; it  was  net  unfair.  It  was  such 
a  conception  of  the  South  as  squared 
with  the  facts.  This  conception  he 
was  not  to  chisel  into  cold,  unfeeling 
marble,  but  was  to  throw  it  out  into 


\ 


air  full 
terpre- 
3cak  of 
y,   and 
honor, 
iMr. 
jf    the 
ponsi" 
i^h  to 
)f  the 
urccs, 
:iople. 
skies, 
;,  and 

trials 

con- 
over- 

such 
lared 
n  he 
eling 

into 


T/y/'S  ORATOR 


83 


Northern  thought,  and  to  make  it  liv- 
entire  and  complete  in  Northern  hearts. 
His  traditions,  his  instincts,  his  train- 
ing, came  to  his  help.      His  exquisite 
taste  and  boundless  charity  guided  him. 
1  he  mistake  of  a  word  or  of  an  insin- 
uation   would    have    been    fatal.      He 
accomplished    his  work   like  a   prince. 
He  embodied  his  conception  in  North- 
ern  semiment  and   left   it  to  live  and 
work     in     Northern     convictions.       It 
sensibly    and    perceptibly    moved    the 
sections  nearer   together.      It    thawed 
out  much  coldness,  and  inaugurated  a 
better  day. 

The  gulf  stream  hugged  in  mid- 
winter New  England's  ice-bound  coasts. 
The  warm  winds  from  its  waters  soft- 
ened and  scattered  the  blizzards  that 
rushed  over  New  England's  hills.  It 
was  a  speech  of  twenty  minutes  in 
length,  but  it  did  more  to  unite  the 
North  and  the  South  than  all   the  ora- 


\. 


si 


f:   ■' 


f 


,'r 


^ 


64 


HENRY  IV.  GRADY 


tions  of  politicians  and  discussions  of 
editors  that  had  occupied  pubhc  atten- 
tion since  the  war. 

Mr.  Grady  believed  that 

"  Hate  and  mistrust  are  the  children  of  blind- 
ness. 
Could  North  and  South  but  see  one  an- 
other, 'twere  well ! 
Knowledge  is  sympathy,  charity,   kindness. 

Ignorance  only  is  maker  of  heh. 
Could  we  but  gaze  for  an  hour,  for  a  minute, 

Deep  in  each  other's  unfaltering  eyes, 
Love  were  begun — for  that  look  would  be- 
gin it- 
Born  in  the  flash  of  a  mighty  surprise. 
*  *  -x-  *  *  * 

Then  should  we,  growing  in  strength  and  in 
sweetness, 
Fusing  to  one  indivisible  Soul, 
Dazzle  the  world  with  a  splendid  complete- 
ness, 
Mightily  single,  iunnovably  whole." 

It  was  the  speech  in  which  Mr. 
Grady  j^ave  the  first  national  display 
of  brilliant  imagery  from  the  boundless 
resources  of  his  illuminated  spirit. 
Upon  that  occasion  he  was  like  an 
animated  Aurora  with  the  variation?  of  a 


)'  t 


THE  ORATOR 


85 


an- 


iMr. 

)lay 
lless 
Irit. 
an 


luminous  sunset,  and  managed  in  twen- 
ty minutes  to  bathe  the  whole  nation  in 
splendid  light.  Never  did  light  in  contact 
with  cloud  and  water  and  dust,  produce 
a  better  twenty  minutes  display  than  did 
the  light  of  Grady's  oration  in  contact 
with  the  sorrows  and  disappointments 
and  achievements  and  hopes  of  South- 
ern history,  throw  out  before  the 
brilliant  company  that  make  up  the 
New  England  society  in  New  York  on 
that  night.  That  was  the  time  we 
all  went  to  the  sacred  altar  of  the  Re- 
public to  repent  of  our  national  sins, 
and  to  pledge  ourselves  to  higher  think- 
ing, sweeter  feeling  and  grander  action. 
The  last  great  speech  Mr.  Grady 
ever  delivered  was  in  Boston.  It  was 
upon  the  occasion  of  a  banquet  given 
by  the  merchants  of  that  city.  He 
was  asked  to  discuss  the  race  problem. 
His  former  addresses  and  work  had 
come  to  the  attention  of  the  republic. 


\\  \ 


1 

! 

1 

'v 

■i 

1 

■  i 

80 


HENRY  IV.   GRADY 


He   was   the    acknowledged    leader  of 
the  South.      What  he  said  was  insured 
a  hearing  and  what  he  wrote  a  reading. 
He  was  to  speak  on  a  subject  less  un- 
derstood and  more  often  treated  than 
any  in  our  social  life.      A  theme  hack- 
neyed and  old,  but  a  theme  ever  new, 
because   coming  up  in  so   many  forms, 
and  charged  with  interests  so  peculiar 
and  relations  so  difficult  of  adjustment. 
He  was  to  speak  in  the  home  of  Sum- 
ner and  Phillips,  and  under  the  shadow 
of  Fanuel   Hall.      He  was  to   be  just 
to  the  South,  fair  to  a  weak  and  be- 
lated race,  and  true  to  the  facts,  from 
which  conclusions  had  been  drawn  so 
diverse.      He  had  a  conception  of  the 
colored  race,    and   a  solution  for  the 
colored  problem. 

It  was  not  to  be  settled  by  law,  or 
by  force,  or  by  editorials,  written  at  a 
distance  from  the  South,  but  by  love. 
He  was  a  true  and  tried  friend  of  the 


ader  of 
insured 
eading. 
ess  un- 
?d  than 
3  hack- 
er new, 

forms, 
Peculiar 
5tment. 
f  Sum- 
shadow 
be  just 
nd  be- 
s,  from 
a.wn  so 

of  the 
or  the 

law,  or 

m  at  a 

y  love. 

of  the 


THE  ORATOR  ^7 

colored   people.      He  had   been  petted 
and   nursed  when  a  child  by  a  colored 
^namma.     He  had  been  m.lted  by  thcir 
songs   and  charm.<l  by  their  f.Jk  lore 
All    who   knew   his  heart,    understoc  d 
that  he  could   not  have  been  unjust   to 
them.     He  uttered  his  nK.ssa,cMn  Bos- 
ton, and  through  Boston  t(.  the  people 
of  this  country.      They  heard  and  pon- 
^lered  it.      They  said.  "  These  are  the 
words   of  an   earnest,    honest,    manly 
man.      They  are  spoken  in  love.      We 
shall  treasure  them  and  honor  the  man 
who  uttered   them."     Those   who  dif 
fered  from  bin,  did  so  in  respect  and 
good   will. 

He  left  the  scenes  of  his  triumph 
wrapped  in  the  nation's  applause,  and 
ca.ne  i,on,e  to  die  amid  the  tears  and 
the  an-uish  of  his  people. 

good,  shall  e-  ist- 

Not  its  se,nbla„ce,  but  itself;  no  beauty,  „or 
good,  nor  power 


68 


HENRY  IV.  GRADY 


Whose  voice  has  j^one  forth,    but  each  sur- 
vives for  the  niolodist, 
When  eternity  affirnis  the  conception  of  an 
hour. 

The  hif^'h  that  prov'd  too   high,  the  heroic  for 
earth  too  hard. 
The  ])assion  that  left    tlie  ground    to  lose 
itself  in  the  sky. 

Are  music  sent  up  to  God   by  the  lover  and 
the  bard. 


h  sur- 
of  an 
Die  for 
0  lose 
ir  and 


HENRY  W.  GRADY 


^be  /©an. 


Art's   use;  what   is    it    but    to    touch    the 
springs 
Of  nature  ?     Hut  to  hold  a  torch  up  for 
Humanity  in  Life's  larj^e  ctjrridor, 

To  f;uide  the  feet  of  ])casants  and  of  kings  ! 

What  is  it  but  to  carry  union  through 
Thoughts  alien  to  thoughts  kindred,   and 

to  merge 
The  lines  of  color  that  should  not  diverge, 

And  give  the  sun  awindow  to  shine  through! 

What  is  it  but  to  make  the  world  have  heed 
For  what  its  dull  eyes  would  hardly  scan! 

To  draw  in  a  stark  light  a  shameless  deed, 
And  show  the  fashion  of  a  kingly  man  ! 

To  cherish  honor,  and  to  smite  all  shame, 

To  lend  hearts  voices,  and  give  all  thoughts 

a  name !" 

—Gilbert  Parker. 


CHAPTER  III. 
Henry  W.   Grady,   the  Man. 
Henry  W.  Grady  ^vas  horn  in  Athens, 
Georgia,    in   1851.      He  was   educated 
at  the  University  of  the  state,  located 
in    the  place    of    his  nativity.      While 
quite   young  he    joined    the    Methodist 
church,    and   was  a   member   of  it  till 
his  death.      He  grew  up  without  form- 
ing    bad   habits.       He    tasted   neither 
tea,  nor  coffee,  nor  wine,  nor  tobacco; 
he   never  even   learned  to  drink  n^ilk.' 
Nothing  but  pure  water  ever  passed  his 
hps.      Yet   no   one   relished   more   the 
simple  pleasures  of  life. 

•*  Life  was  ^ocd  to  liin,,  and  there  ov  hero 
With   that  sufficim;  joy,  the  day  was  never 
cheaj). 

Thereto  his  mind  was  its  own  ample  sphere 
^  ^  ^  ^  -sf         %, 


02 


HENRY  \\\   CRADY 


Made  its  own  climate,  nor  could  any  niai'},'e 
Trared   by  convention  stay  him   from  his 
bent, 

He  had  a  iiahitiide  of  mountain  air  ; 
He  hrouf^ht  wide  outlook  where  he  went." 

The  world  meant  more  t(j  him  and 
hroufj^ht  more  to  him  than  to  others. 
The  changing  seasons  stimulated  and 
cheered  him. 

The  flying'  clouds  dropped  somethinpj 
from  their  white  folds  into  his  thought 
that  moved  him  and  lifted  him.  The 
flowers  in  the  meadow  and  field  whis- 
pered to  his  ear  thinj^s  that  others  did 
not  hear.  The  jj^olden  air,  down  which 
he  saw,  when  a  boy,  the  pigeons  fly, 
had  a  blessed  meaning  to  him.  The 
solemn     night    and     the     falling    dew 

brought  awe  and  reverence  to  his  spirit. 

*'  Nature  and  he  went  liand  in  hand 

Across  the  hills  and  down  the  lonely  lane; 
*  -X-  ^  *  *  ^ 

So  She,  who  loved  him  for  his  love  of  her, 
Made  him  the  heir  to  traceries  and  signs 

On  tiny  children  nigh  too  small  to  stir 
In  great  green  plains  or  hazel  leaf  of  vines, 


!• 


!•! 


Tin-:  MAX 


03 


iiarge 
rom  his 


^ent." 
in  and 
Jthers. 
d  and 

ethin/T^ 
louf^ht 
The 
whis- 
rs  did 
which 
s   fly. 
The 
dew 
ipirit. 

'  lane; 

f  her, 
signs 

vines. 


She  tau^'ht  tlic  treble  (jf  the  niKhtin,i;ale; 
Revealed  the  velvet  secret  of  the  rose." 

I. 

Goin^  from   Ori/aba  to  the   City  of 
Mexico,    in    company    with    a    friend, 
through   the   valley  of   A|)ani,  we   had 
just  passed   the   pyramids  of  Cholula, 
thirty  miles  out  from  the  capital  of  the 
Montezumas.     The  train  was  movinir 
toward  the  west.       The  sun  was  about 
thirty  minutes  above  the  horizon.     The 
atmosj)here  at  t.ie  high  altitude  upon 
which   we    were    moving,    holds   com- 
merce  with   the   sinking   light   after   a 
form  and  fashion   indescribably  beauti- 
ful.      The  serious  and  somber  rays  are 
received  and  quenched,  while  the  bright 
and  gay  notes  are  thrown  into  a  sym- 
phony of  color  that  beggars  deiinition. 

The  sun  itself  seemed  to  be  the  hub 
of  a  wheel  with  an  infinite  number  of 
spokes.  These  radiated  from  the  cen- 
ter  and   lengthened  out  every  whither 


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//EXRY  n:   GRADY 


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I 


into  an  occidental  circle  as  large  as  half 
the  whole  round  sky.  It  was  the  song 
of  the  sun,  seemingly  raised  to  cele- 
brate the  departure  of  that  orb  to  the 
shores  of  other  lands.  The  valley  with 
its  maguey  plantations,  the  city  with 
its  distant  spires,  and  the  rim  of  the 
surrounding  mountains  were  literally 
baptized  in  the  waves  of  the  glorious 
music  played  by  the  sinking  day.  Po- 
pocatepetl with  white  head  18,000  feet 
above  sea  level,  blushed,  as  if  agitated 
by  the  pleasant  suspicion  that  the 
whole  chorub  vvas  a  love  song  sent  by 
the  sun  to  her  willing  heart. 

The  elements  in  Grady's  spirit  were 
so  rarified  and  combined  after  the  pro- 
visions of  some  fresh  formula,  that 
when  the  light  from  behind  the  sunlight 
fell  on  them  only  the  bright  colors  were 
thrown  back  and  wheeled  into  a  circle 
of  luminous  splendor  about  his  throb- 
bing life.      I  have  seen  people  stop  to 


IP' 


THE  MAN 


05 


were 


look  at  him  as  he  moved  with  gladsome 
swing  and  straight,  vigorous  step  along 
the  street,  as  they  would  stop  to  ob- 
serve some  striking  phenomenon  of  na- 
ture. 

There  was  a  perpetual  charm  about 
his  personality  that  could  be  wciked 
out  by  no  science.      It  was  caused  by 
the   play  of    light   from   some   unseen 
source  upon  the  elements  of  his  mar- 
velous   spirit.      By   the    magnetism  of 
his  perL>"h  Jiiy,  by  the  impact  of  his 
spirit,  by  the  warmth  of  his  thought,  he 
was  capable  of  raising  men  to  a  very 
high  degree  of  social  temperature.      It 
was  in  this  way  he  got  so  much  from 
them  for  the  public  good.      He  lifted 
them  with  all  they  had   to  the  point 
where     they     glowed    and    radiated. 
Money  was  released  from  the  gravity 
of  selfishness  which  keeps  it  generally 
so  close  to  the  ground,  till  it  circled 
around  like  feathers  in  the  wind.    Thus 


00 


HENRY  W,   GRADV 


he  was  capable  of  astonishing!^  feats. 
At  one  time  he  raised  seventy  or  eighty 
thousand  dollars  from  the  public-spir- 
ited men  of  his  native  city,  to  erect  the 
finest  Young  Men's  Christian  Associa- 
tion building  that  stands  in  the  South- 
ern States.  To  have  carried  men  as 
high  as  he  did  above  the  common  lev- 
els of  ordinary  human  life,  for  the  pur- 
pose of  helping  forward  great  com- 
mercial and  moral  enterprises,  would 
have  been  to  sacrifice  their  confidence, 
had  it  not  been  for  the  fact  that  it 
was  known  that  Grady  did  not  know 
what  selfishness  meant.  He  was  al- 
ways oblivious  to  his  own  monetary  in- 
terests. The  money  he  had  was  sub- 
ject to  every  good  cause.  The  giving 
point  was  not  an  altitude  to  which  he 
climbed  occasionally.  It  constituted 
the  permanent  tableland  of  his  life. 

It  is  well  known  that  meat  and  bread 
will  not  keep  one  alive  unless  he  feeds 


fi:  feats. 
5r  eighty 
)Iic-spir- 
Jrect  the 
f\ssocia- 

South- 
rnen  as 
on  lev- 
thepur- 
t  com- 

would 
idence, 
that  it 

know 
^'as  al- 
ary in- 
s  sub- 
giving 
ch  he 
ituted 
fe. 

bread 
feeds 


THE  MAN  97 

also  on  the  atmosphere.     There  was 
in  Grady,  as  there  is  within  us  all,   a 
spirit  that  called  for  an  equation  with 
finer  food   than  could  be  made   with 
bread  and  meat  and  air.      He   fed  on 
the  effluence  of  an  eternal  intelligence, 
and  partook  of  sentiments  from  the  un^ 
seen    sources    of    unfailing    emotion. 
Grady's  career  was  the  unwinding  of 
the  skein  of  thought  deposited  in  the 
possibilities  of  his  life,  and  the  drama 
of  his  existence  was  the  recovery  of 
the  incidents  and  events  that  floated 
in  the   love    which   gave  him    to  the 
world. 

Wordsworth  says,  "  Our  birth  is  a 
forgetting,  the  soul  that  rises  with  us, 
ou-  life  star  hath  had  elsewhere  its  set- 
ting, and  Cometh  from  afar;  we  come 
from  God,  who  is  our  home,  and  we 
forget  the  glories  we  have  known,  and 
that  imperial  palace  whence  we  come. " 
Grady   kept    up   commerce    with    the 


i    V 


f 


m 


f 


i 


08 


HENRY  IV.  GRADY 


homelands,  and  did  not  forget  the 
imperial  pa  lace  whence  we  come ;  hence 
the  sufferings  of  the  poor  touched  him 
to  tears.  He  recognized  his  kinship 
to  all  God's  children. 

"'Some  find  their  natural  selves,   and  only 

then 
In  furloughs  of  divine  escape  from  men. 
Hut  he  basked  and  bourj;eoned  in  copartnery 
Companionship,  and  opened  windowed  glee." 

He  heard  the  cry  of  the  babe  of 
Bethlehem  across  the  centuries,  and 
this  cry  awakened  within  him  emotion 
and  sympathy  for  all  God's  needy  ones 
on  earth. 

II. 

He  was  concerned  about  all  things 
relating  to  human  life,  its  business,  its 
loves,  its  fears,  its  hopes.  Byron  said 
that  his  college  friends,  after  they  had 
completed  their  studies,  went  about 
the  world  wearing  monstrous  masks, 
as  lawyers,    soldiers,  parsons  and  the 


ii 


get  the 
3;  hence 
led  him 
kinship 

ind  only 

211, 

partnery 
d  glee." 

abe  of 
js,  and 
motion 
\y  ones 


things 
2SS,  its 
>n  said 
jy  had 
about 
lasks, 
d  the 


THE  MAX  yj) 

iike.  Mr.  Grady  looked  through  so- 
cial distinctions  and  official  decorations 
to  the  hearts  and  interests  beneath 
them. 

A  newsboy's  tale  of  sorrow  held 
him,  as  completely  as  the  movements 
of  senators.  As  an  editor  and  an  ora- 
tor he  sought  to  advance  public  inter- 
ests and  social  well  being,  as  a  n,an 
his   work    was    with    individuals.      He 

was  related  by  some  act  of  kindness  to 
every  individual  in  his  native  state.    He 
was    constantly   speaking   a    word    or 
wntmg  a  telegram    about   individuals 
when  they  had  no  thought  of  it.      He 
saweverything  and  felt  everything  that 
concerned    the     people     about    him 
Whether  the^-  were  lawyers,  or  doctors 
or  engmeers.  or  bootblacks,  if  he  came 
to  know  them,    they  were  ever  after 
carried  in  his  thought. 

His  heart  and  his  pocket-book  were 
open,   the  one  to  ^,,^  sympathy,  the 


i: 


n 


i 


;! 


41 


1'  i 


100 


IfEXRY  n:   GRADY 


other  Iiclp.  During  his  hist  days, 
when  dtihrious,  he  was  often  talking 
of  helping  some  poor  fellow  to  get 
a  start.  He  would  say,  "  I'll  give 
twenty-five  dollars,  and  this  one  will 
give  so  much,  and  thus  we  will  get 
him  on  his  feet  again." 

He   had   a   deeply  religious  nature, 
and  strong  faith  in  God. 

On  a  visit  to  his  mother  he  told  her 
he  wanted  to  be  a  boy  again.  She 
toasted  cheese  for  him  in  the  corner 
and  tucked  the  cover  around  him  at 
night,  and  breathed  to  heaven  a 
prayer  for  him  as  she  had  over  her 
little  boy  in  the  years  departed.  She 
carried  him  to  Sunday-school,  and 
when  the  children  sang,  "  Shall  we 
gather  at  the  river?"  he  covered  his 
face  in  both  his  hands  and  cried  like  a 
child.  When  his  mother  came  to  see 
him  in  his  last  illness,  the  first  words 


i'l 


days, 
talking 
to  get 
I  give 
le  will 
ill  get 

ature, 

Id  her 
She 

orner 

in  at 

;n    a 

■  her 
She 
and 

1  we 

I  his 

ke  a 

•  see 

ords 


THE  MAN  ,01 

he  said  to  her  was,  "  Mother,  my  feet 
are  in  the  river." 

When  he  was  at  the  University  of 
Virginia,  he  went  with  a  friend  to  the 
home   of    Thomas  Jefferson.      Having 
reached  the  home  of  the  great  Jeffer- 
son,  a  party  of  young  men  and  women 
who  had  preceded  them  were  engaged 
"^  a  dance.      His  friend  proposed  that 
they  each  get  a  partner  and  join  in  the 
dance. 

Mr.  Grady  said,  "  Do  yo„  know  that 
this  was  the  hon,o  of  the  greatest  man 
who,,,  this  country  has  ever  produced  ' 
He  was  not    only   the    author  of   the 
Declaration  of   In.lependence,    hut   he 
was  ConRressnian,  Governor.    I-o,ei.rn 
Minister,    Secretary    of    State.    Vice- 
President  and  President  of  the  United 
States;  and  it  does  seem  to  „,e  a  dese- 
cration to  sing  and  dance  in  thought- 
Jess  revelry  over  the  ashes  of  the  Sage 
of  Monticello. " 


( 


I 


1 1 


.,^'! 


102 


IlEXRY  IV.   GRADY 


His  friend  went  into  the  room  to  get 
his  partner,  while  Mr.  Grady  walked 
under  the  stars  to  coinniune  with  the 
spirit  of  the  ^Meat  man  who  had  made 
that  a  (lassie  spot  in  America.  To  stand 
with  uncovered  head  on  Bunker  Hill, 
out  of  respect  to  the  memory  of  those 
who  had  made  that  mound  memorable, 
was  the  most  natural  thing  in  the  world 
for  him  to  do.  He  loved  his  country- 
men. He  had  a  nature  that  had  been 
touched  and  made  soft  and  universal 
by  the  religion  of  Him  who  loved  all 
men.  This  it  was  that  enabled  him  to 
hold  in  his  hand  the  key  that  promised 
to  bring  the  lightnings  from  the  dark 
clouds  of  misunderstanding  above  our 
political  sky,  harmless  to  the  ground. 

An  insight  into  the  repose  and  beauty 
of  Mr.  Grady's  spirit  may  be  had  by 
the  following  short  editorial  from  his 
pen  written  for  his  paper,  The  Atlanta 
Constitution,  exactly  a  year  before  the 


n 


THE  MAN  ,03 

'l-'y  of  his  burial.     The  subject  was. 
"  A  Perfect  Christmas  Day." 

"  No  man  or  woman  now  hvinfj  will 
see  again  such  a  Christmas  day  as  the 
one  which  closed  yesterday,  when  the 
dy.n«  sun  piled  the  western  skies  with 
gold  and  purple.     A  winter  day  it  was 
shot   to  the   core    with    sunshine.      \t 
was  enchanting  to  walk  abroad  in  its 
prodigal  beauty,  to  breathe  its  eli.xir 
to   reach    out  the   hands   and   plunge 
them  open  fingered  through  its  pulsing 
waves  of  warmth   and   freshness       It 
was  June  and  November  welded  and 
fused  into  a  perfect  glory  that  held  the 
sunshine  and  snow  beneath  tender  and 
splendid    skies.      To   have   winnowed 
such  a  day  from  the   teeming  winter 
was  to  have  found  an  odorous  peach 
on  a  bough  whipped  in  the  storms  of 
wmter.      One  caught  the  musk  of  yel- 
low grain,  the  flavor  of  ripening  nuts 
the  fragrance  of  strawberries,  the  ex' 


104 


HENRY  \V.  GRADY 


i.  I 


\}A 


quisite  odor  of  violets,  the  aroma  of 
all  seasons  in  the  wonderful  day.  The 
hum  of  bees  underrode  the  whistling 
winf^s  of  wild  ^eese  flying  southward. 
The  lire  slept  in  drowsing;  grates  while 
the  people  marvelinj^  out-doors 
watched  the  south  winds  woo  the 
roses  and  the  lilies. 

"  Truly  it  was  a  day  of  days.   Amidst 
its  riotous  luxury  surely  life  was  worth 
living  to  hold  up  the  head  and  breathe 
it  in  as  thirsting  men  drink  water.    To 
put  every  sense  on  its  gracious  excel- 
lence, to  throw  the  hands  wide  apart 
and  hug  whole  armfuls  of  the  day  close 
to  the  heart  till  the  heart  itself  is  en- 
raptured and  illumined.     God's  bene- 
diction came  down  with  the  day  slow 
dropping  from  the  skies.     God's  smile 
was   its   light   and    all    through    and 
through  its  supernal  beauty  and  still- 
ness unspoken  but  appealing  to  every 
heart  and  sanctifying  every  soul,  was 


THE  MAN 


105 


his  invocation  and    promise.      '  Peace 
on  earth,  ^^ood  will   to  men.'  " 

As  of  William  of  Orange,  it  may  be 
said  of  Mr.  Grady  when  he  died,  "  The 
little  children  cried  in  the  streets." 

••In  the  wild  .uitiiniu  weather,  when  the  rain 

was  on  the  sta, 
And  tiie  Ijou^hs  s()l)hed  togetiier,  Death  came 

and  spoke  to  nie: 
'Those  red  dr()j)s  of  thy  heart  I  have  come  to 

take  fn^m  thee; 
As  the  storm  sheds  the  rose,  so  thy  love  shall 

broken  l)e,* 

Said  Death  to  me. 

•'Then  I  stood  strai^dit  and  fearless  while  the 

rain  was  in  the  wave, 
And  I  si)ake  low  and  tearless:     'When  thou 

hast  made  my  j^rave, 
Those  red   drops   from  my  heart  then  thou 

shalt  surely  have; 
But  the  rose  keeps  its  bloom,  as  I  my  love  will 

save 

All  for  my  grave.' 

"  In  the  wild  autumn  weather  a  dread  sword 

slipped  from  its  sheath; 
While  the  boughs  sobbed  together,  I  fought  a 

fight  with  Death, 


100 


HENRY  \V.   GRADY 


And  I  vanquished  him  with  prayer,  and  I  van- 

(liiishcd  him  hy  faith; 
Now  tlie  siwnmer  air  is  sweet  with  tlie  rose's 

fragrant  hrcatli 

That  conquered  Death." 


It' 


Finis. 


I* 


ticl  I  van- 
le  rose's 


